Classes will resume on Monday at the Plateau State Polytechnic after the lecturers suspended a three months old strike, The PUNCH learnt on Wednesday.
“I have directed the Registrar of the Polytechnic to put up a memo asking the students to return to the campus immediately.
“We don’t want to waste further time after the union members have called off their strike. But lectures will start in the instruction from Monday,” The institution’s Rector, John Dawan, said in an interview with our correspondent in Jos on Wednesday.
The Plateau state chapter of the Academic Staff Union of Polytechnic had in June 2022 declared an indefinite strike alongside six other tertiary institutions in the state over issues bordering on their welfare
It was learnt that the Joint Union, Academic Staff of Plateau state-owned Tertiary Institutions agreed to suspend the strike after its meeting with government officials on Tuesday.
The Chairman of JUAPSTI, Dabam Lawam, confirmed the suspension of the strike in the seven tertiary institutions in the state to The PUNCH in Jos on Wednesday
Lawam, who is a lecturer with the College of Arts Science and Technology, Kurgwi in Quan-Pan Local Government Area of the state said, “Yes, it is true that all the seven tertiary institutions in the state that have been on strike since June have agreed to suspend the strike.
“We met with state government officials including the state Head of Service and the Permanent Secretary Establishment on Tuesday and they signed an agreement on behalf of the government before we agreed to suspend the strike.
It is now left for the management of the various tertiary institutions to fix their date of resumption but our members are ready to start work because we have suspended the strike.”.
Asked what was contained in the agreement which the union signed with the state government, the union leader said
“During the negotiation, we presented five issues and the government has agreed to implement them including our demand for the consolidation of our salary structure, implementation of staff promotions, stoppage of illegal deductions from our salaries, and the issue of non-remittance of third-party deductions as well as recruitment of staff to cater for the large students’ populations among others.
“We are aware of the attitude of the government in reneging with the agreement in the past but we decided to give them the benefits of the doubt this time.
“Any time we discover insincerity on the part of the government towards the implementation of the agreement, we will have no option than to resume the strike, ” the chairman added.
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