ASUU Faults Ondo’s Failure To Implement 2025 Agreement

Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), Akure Zone, has decried the Ondo State government’s failure to implement the financial provisions of the 2025 federal government-ASUU agreement, six months after the pact took effect.

The union stated this on yesterday at a press conference addressed by its zonal coordinator, Adeola Egbedokun, at the University of Medical Sciences (UNIMED), Ondo.

He described the government’s continued inaction as detrimental to lecturers’ welfare and the quality of higher education in the state.

Egbedokun said that despite receiving the agreement and being fully aware of its obligations, the Ondo State Government had yet to adopt and implement its provisions, thereby denying lecturers their legitimate entitlements while arrears continued to accumulate.

He explained that the 2025 FGN-ASUU Agreement, signed on 23 December 2025, was the first comprehensive agreement reached between the Federal Government and ASUU since the landmark 2009 pact, and became effective on 1 January 2026.

He noted that the agreement’s financial provisions include the Consolidated Academic and Research Allowance (CATA), the Earned Academic Allowance (EAA), and the Professorial Allowance.

According to him, the union agreed to forgo more than N100 billion in accumulated EAA arrears owed by the Federal Government on the condition that the allowance would be mainstreamed into lecturers’ monthly salaries at 10 per cent of their basic pay.

He said, “Regrettably, up till today, the Ondo State Government has failed to implement this agreement.

These provisions were carefully negotiated to improve staff welfare, encourage academic productivity and excellence in research, and enhance the quality of university education across the country.”

The ASUU coordinator maintained that there was no justification for the delay, arguing that state governments have the authority, responsibility and financial capacity to implement the agreement without further postponement.

‎He added that Ondo State, as the leading oil-producing state in the South-West and a beneficiary of the 13 per cent derivation fund, should have been among the first states to implement the agreement.

‎Egbedokun also criticised the state’s decision to set up a committee to review an agreement that had already been negotiated, stressing that representatives of state-owned universities participated in the negotiations that produced the pact.

‎”What is required is implementation, not prolonged committee engagements that merely postpone government action while lecturers continue to suffer. If the Federal Government has already signed and implemented the agreement and several states have commenced implementation, what exactly is Ondo State constituting another committee for?” he queried.

‎He lamented that the persistent delay in implementing nationally negotiated welfare packages had become a recurring pattern in Ondo State, resulting in low staff morale, brain drain, declining research output and avoidable industrial tension, with far-reaching implications for students and the quality of tertiary education.

‎The union therefore urged the Ondo State Government to immediately implement the 2025 FGN-ASUU Agreement across all state-owned tertiary institutions, commence payment of CATA, EAA, and the Professorial Allowance, clear all arrears accumulated since 1 January 2026, and discontinue what it described as unnecessary bureaucratic processes delaying implementation.

‎ASUU added that “failure to act with the urgency demanded by this situation will leave ASUU with no option but to activate all lawful and legitimate actions available within the framework of a trade union to press home its demands.”

Reacting on behalf of the Ondo State Government, the Commissioner for Education, Science and Technology, Prof. Igbekele Ajibefun, assured that the state would soon implement the 2025 FGN-ASUU Agreement, stating that the government had already commenced the process.

‎”I am sure that very soon, the Ondo State government will take action on it. I also want you to know that FG signed the agreement with ASUU and to be domesticated by state governments; most state governments have not also implemented it, so it’s not just Ondo state,” he said.