Govt Should Increase Lecturers’ Salaries — Uniosun Pro-Chancellor, Yusuf Ali

The Pro-Chancellor, Osun State University, Mallam Yusuf Alli, SAN, yesterday urged Federal and State Government to consider upward review of salaries of lecturers and workers of universities across the country to meet realities of rising inflation.

Alli, while speaking at the 11th convocation ceremony of the institution in Osogbo campus, advised that various university council should be empowered to negotiate salaries and other welfare packages for their workers.

According to him, “It is obvious that our educational system is undergoing Tsunami like changes but unfortunately negatively. It is widely known and acknowledged that funding has been a consistent challenge to the advancement of knowledge in our educational sector, this is more so in our universities, some of which are like glorified secondary schools.

“In order to address the problem of incessant strikes by various unions in the universities, it is high time the salaries of workers in the universities be reviewed upward, to meet the realities of inflation. Going forward, we should put in place a system of automatic adjustment of salaries, within an agreed time frame say between 2 to 3 years to address inflationary trends in the economy, as it happens in other places. The Councils as the Employers in the university system, should be empowered to negotiate salaries and other welfare packages for their academic and non-academic members of the staff.

“It is equally suggested that we adopt international best practices in rewarding lecturers by ensuring that those who are able to attract grants to the universities, are paid commensurate to what they are able to attract”.

Meanwhile, while emphasising the prudent nature of the university, the Vice Chancellor, Professor Clement Adebooye said the institution in the last eight months saved over N300 million in tax liability and N175 million in running cost.

He disclosed that 46 students bagged first-class, while 561 students graduated with second-class upper, 1012 got second-class lower, 279 had third class and one person has pass.

Earlier, chancellor of the institution, Dr Folorunsho Alakija in her message to the graduands urged them to be creative with the entrepreneurial skills that they have acquired in the school and apply the knowledge in their field of study to enable them strive so as to carve a niche for themselves.

She also disclosed that the school will soon commission a state-of-the-art Teaching Hospital that she is building for the school.