ABEOKUTA– The Academic Staff Union of Polytechnic, (ASUP), Mapoly chapter has label the management of the institution as bereft of ideas, even as it called the action of the institution Public Relations Officer, Mr. Oluyemi Ajibola as unprofessional in the ensuing imbroglio between the union and the management of the institution over the non payment of staff salaries and other sundries demands.
The union Chairman, Comrade Babatunde Osifalujo in a statement made available to The News Ville on Tuesday, stated that the union in the last two years had called on the state governor Prince Dapo Abiodun to constitute a governing council of the institution, a move the chairman said is long over due.
“In the last two years the Union had called and champion how the government of Prince Dapo Abiodun bailed the institution out and one wonders how the Management of the institution who seems clueless, bereft of ideas and not bothered about the welfare of the numerous staff even at this period of the year would results to cheap blackmail of the Union which has been at the forefront of stabilizing the institution even when members had gone for months without salary.
“The Union believes that the blind loyalty of the institution PRO to his principal has resulted in this very unprofessional and unprovoked attack on the Union.
“That the Union is asking the visitor to the school to come to the aid of your principal who seem to be bereft of ideas on how to pay the staff of the institution, rather than applaud them for actions that you and your Management could not take, you have resulted to blackmail the Union.
“The Academic staff Union of Polytechnic (Mapoly chapter) would rather concentrate on making staff of the institution to have a pleasant yuletide than to condescend to the level of a desperate public relations officer who must keep his job even at the cost of starving all staff of the Polytechnic”, Osifalujo fumed
Recall that the institution PRO had questioned the rational behind the union’s calls, saying that it is directly targeted at embarrassing the State Governor, Prince Dapo Abiodun in bad light.
Ajibola in his reaction added that the statement credited to the ASUP Chairman, accusing the state government of owing the staff November and December salaries as unfolding, adding that MAPOLY remains a self-sustaining institution.
He noted that the state government is not collecting revenue from the Polytechnic which makes the institution self-dependent.
Part of the demand of the union includes the convocation of Governing Council, domestication of the New Polytechnic Act, appointment of substantive Rector for the institution, and the immediate payment of over three sessions honorarium and subsequent stoppage to the accumulation of Part Time claims amongst others.
The union also added that the delay in staff promotion and appointments, the issue of new minimum wage yet to be implemented in the institution, resolution to matters on pensions, entitlement and plight of MAPOLY Staff retirees and non-remittance of Union outstanding cheque-off dues, more importantly when the Union had kept to its own side of the bargain should be looked into by the state government.
