By Sarah NEGEDU
There are indications that the protracted Local Education Authority, LEA, teacher’s strike in the nation’s capital, may soon come to an end, as all parties seem to have finally reached an agreement.
This is following a meeting conveyed at the instance of the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Nyesom Wike, with the leadership of the Nigeria Union of Teachers, NUT, and chairmen of the six area councils.
Chief of Staff to the minister, Chidi Amadi, who dropped the hint at the end of the closed-door meeting of all stakeholders on Thursday, explained that after extensive deliberation, decision was reached to put the issues to rest.
According to him, part of the resolution was to withhold the 10 percent accrued Internally Generated Revenue, IGR, of the area councils for the past six months.
He further explained that the funds would be used to settle 70 percent of the minimum wage owed the teachers saying, “Although it will not cover 100 percent of the debt for now, it will cover about 70 percent. This is a laudable move towards addressing the fracas once and for all.
The chief of staff added that the minister had also directed that a Special Committee be set up, comprising three members of the NUT, two members from FCTA, one of the area council chairmen and representative of NANs.
He added that the committee would revisit all the other outstanding issues and within the next two weeks, submit a report detailing how the other outstanding issues would be permanently addressed.
“In addition to addressing the issues of the primary school teachers, Wike had taken a decision to address all outstanding issues of the local government employees.
“The minister pledged to personally intervene to ensure that their demands are addressed by the FCTA. This is to ensure that the area councils resume full operations effectively immediately.”
The Chairman of the Abaji Area Council, Abubakar Abdullahi, who spoke on behalf of other council chairmen, said the decision is painful for the chairmen but has been accepted in good faith.
“We just finished a meeting with the minister, the leadership of the NUT, and the Area Council Chairmen. Resolutions were passed, although they did not favour the Chairman, as our six months’ IGR has been entirely committed to settling this issue.
“Our plea to the NUT is to consider our children and call off the strike. The minister clearly stated that, legally, he has no right to withhold 10percent of the Area Councils’ IGR to pay NUT debts. But by God’s grace, the Chairman agreed, in the interest of peace and education, to release that amount.
“We hope that before the close of work today, the union will call off the strike, and by tomorrow, our children will return to school,” he said.
Also, the NUT Chairman, Mohammed Shafa, acknowledged the deliberation, but said he would have to get back to the NUT State Executive Council, where the final decision would be taken.
It will be recalled that primary school teachers in the Federal Capital Territory had embarked on the strike in March over non-implementation of minimum wage, among other issues including the non-implementation and payment of 25 percent and 35 percent salary increase, and non-implementation and payment of 40 percent peculiar allowance.
The union were also demanding the payment of the N35,000 wage award and the implementation of the template on outstanding entitlements of teachers as agreed in 2022.
Other participants at the meeting, included representatives of the National Association of Nigerian Students, NANs, and the National Assembly.
