The leadership of the National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS) has applauded the Federal Government over its decision to exempt tertiary institutions from the Integrated Personnel Payroll Information System (IPPIS) payment platform.
The student body also commended the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) for its resilience and tenacity in the struggle that has led to the eventual removal of universities, polytechnics, colleges of education and other tertiary institutions from IPPIS.
Recall that the Federal Executive Council presided over by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu had, on Wednesday, approved the exemption of tertiary institutions from IPPIS in response to strident demand by ASUU and other staff unions of the institutions for them to be exempted from Federal Government payment platform because of inherent peculiarities.
Minister of Education, Professor Tahir Maman, who conveyed the decision of the FEC after its weekly meeting on Wednesday, said the Vice-Chancellors and other heads of the affected institutions have gotten relief to embark on recruitment exercise without recourse to the Head of Service of the Federation.
The minister said the president had directed that the Vice Chancellor be taken out of the platform that made recruitment difficult to ensure efficient management of those education institutions.
Mamman said: “Simply, the president and the council are just concerned about efficiency of management of the universities and so it has nothing to do with integrity or options of platforms.
“The president cannot understand why Vice Chancellors should be leaving their duty post and run to Abuja to get staff enlisted on IPPIS when they get recruited.
“The basic concern is that universities are governed by laws. And those laws give them autonomy in certain respects and most respects and the IPPIS has sort of eroded that autonomy granted universities in accordance with their act.”
NANS President, Comrade Lucky Emonefe, in a statement he signed and made available to newsmen on Thursday in Abuja, said the laudable decision of the government was a big relief to tertiary institutions in the country.
Emonefe said apart from ensuring efficient management of tertiary institutions, the removal of universities from the IPPIS platform would go a long way in addressing one of the root causes of incessant strike actions by ASUU and its debilitating effects on students in Nigeria.
He noted that the genuine agitation by ASUU for the government to exempt universities from the IPPIS payment platform over time had been unnecessarily resisted by government officials in defiance of the universities’ autonomy and laws establishing the institutions.
“We commend the Federal Executive Council presided by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu for this landmark decision. Government is about people and we have seen that FEC has demonstrated this by bowing to the demands by staff unions in tertiary institutions for them to be excluded from enrollment on IPPIS platform because of certain peculiarities in running of the institutions.
“We also commend the staff unions, especially members of ASUU for their resilience and tenacity in the struggle to ensure better funding and smooth running of tertiary institutions in Nigeria as it is done all over the world.
“We urge the Federal and state governments to accede to other demands of ASUU and other staff unions of tertiary institutions in order to achieve the needed industrial harmony that will guarantee uninterrupted academic calendar in higher education in Nigeria.”
