Nasarawa university set to resume as govt. agrees to pay salaries

The Nasarawa State University Keffi (NSUK), will soon resume after the state government agreed to shoulder the responsibility for the payment of salaries of the staff of the university.

Nasarawa State Governor, Engineer Abdullahi Sule, disclosed this while briefing members of the state executive council, at the fifth state executive council meeting, which was held at the Government House, on Wednesday.

Briefing the council on recent developments across the educational, health and security sectors of the state, the governor announced the decision of his administration to agree to take over the payment of salaries at the university, thereby meeting one of the key demands by the local chapter of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), thus paving the way for the possible resumption of academic activities.

The governor said that based on the available finances to the state and especially because of the importance attached to education, his administration has agreed to take over the responsibility of paying salaries of staff at the NSUK, beginning this month.

He pointed out that, so far, the management of the university, as well as the non-teaching unions namely the Senior Staff Association of Nigerian Universities (SSANU) and the Non-Academic Staff Union of Universities (NASU) have all agreed to open the university.

“One of the conditions they gave to us, the most important condition, is to ensure that we take over the full payment of salaries of all the staff so that they don’t have to use their IGR.

“As far as we are concerned, we looked at our finances and we strongly believe that based on the cashflow we have available to us and also because of the importance we attach to education, we should be able to start that from this month.

“That is what we are looking forward to doing. We are also hoping they will compliment by the moment we start the payment hopefully by Thursday or Friday, then we are hoping to see them also returning to their classes,” the governor stated.