The Academic Staff Union of Polytechnics at the Federal Polytechnic Bali in Taraba State has demanded payment of seven years outstanding promotion arrears and three months of withheld salaries.
The unit chairman of ASUP, Comrade Umar Aliyu, stated this while briefing journalists after the end of the union’s congress in Bali.
Aliyu stated that the national body of polytechnic staff had rejected the new schemes of service for polytechnics which was recently issued by the National Board for Technical Education (NBTE).
He said the conditions of service in federal polytechnics was lamentable compared to better career prospects and good conditions of service enjoyed by the academic staff of other tertiary institutions.
Aliyu said it takes 26 years for graduate assistants teaching in the polytechnic to reach the peak of their careers while their counterparts in universities use between 18 and 20 years to become full lecturers.
He described the new scheme of service as totally different from the submission of stakeholders of polytechnics, adding that it would further bring setbacks for practitioners in the sector.
“We blame the management of Federal Polytechnic Bali for the delay in the payment of members’ monetary arrears of promotion of seven years as well as three months’ salary arrears for staff employed in the years 2019 and 2020,” he said.