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President Bola Tinubu has directed that federal universities, polytechnics and colleges of education be exempted from the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS) ending years of contention between government and the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) with staff unions of other tertiary institutions.
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ASUU has commended the government for “finally” coming to terms with the dynamics and peculiarities of the university system.
ASUU and Non-Academic Staff Union of Educational and Associated Institutions (NASU) have consistently argued that the IPPIS payment platform adopted by the federal government to resolve all salaries and other financial entitlements for tertiary institution staff workers, was “un-implementable.”
The university unions said IPPIS has not reduced financial waste or tame corruption in universities and insisted that the government discard the IPPIS for an alternative platform: the University General and Peculiar Payment Platform (UG3P).
This week in Abuja, the Minister of Education, Prof. Mamman Tahir, announced shortly after the Federal Executive Council meeting presided over by President Tinubu that tertiary institutions were no longer obliged to use IPPIS.
His words: “Today, the universities and other tertiary institutions have gotten a very big relief from the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System.
“You will recall that the university authorities and the others have been clamouring for the exemption of the universities and other tertiary institutions from this system.
“Today, Council has graciously approved that. What that means is that going forward, the universities and other tertiary institutions, the polytechnics and colleges of education, will be taken off the IPPIS.
“Simply, the President and the council are just concerned about the efficiency of management of the universities, and so it has nothing to do with integrity or platform options.
“The President cannot understand why vice chancellors should leave their duty post and run to Abuja to get staff enlisted on IPPIS when they get recruited.
“What that means in simple language is that the university authorities and other tertiary institutions will now be paying their own personnel from their own end instead of relying on the IPPIS.”
