Federal Unity College Teachers storm Civil Service Commission, protest three years of unpaid salaries

Hundreds of Federal unity teachers across the country on Tuesday protested in front of the Civil Service Commission and Head of Service in Abuja, the nation’s capital and demanded the payment of their three years salaries.

The protesters, who stormed an entrance to the Civil Service Commission, said it was unfair for the government to continue to withhold their money.

The teachers are from the Federal Government Colleges (FGC), Federal Government Girls College (FGGC), Federal Government Boys College (FGBC) and Federal Science and Technical Colleges (FSTC).

The teachers, who arrived at the Civil Service Commission around 9 am chanting such as: ‘Government is not a personal thing’, ‘Our teachers deserve better treatment, pay them their salaries, ‘God is against injustice, please pay our teachers’ salaries’, and ‘FG, ease our pain and save our education sector’.

Newsflash Nigeria gathered that the teachers were recruited in  December 2018 into the Federal Unity Schools, but all to date are yet to receive salary and allowances.

The teachers said “We are 2018, 2019 and 2020 recruited officers/unpaid teachers from the 110 Unity Colleges across the six (6) Geo-Political Zones.

“We are patriotic citizens who have served our fatherland for over two years without a dime paid to us as salary or allowance in any way. Our appointment letters are dated 2018, 2019 and even recently, 2020.

“Sir may we humbly use this medium to draw your attention to our plight.

“We are appealing that all processes that will lead to our documentation, capturing and subsequent payment of salary and backlog salaries be fast-tracked.”

Our appeal is based on the following:

1. Over 1700 newly employed teachers in the Federal Government Unity Colleges recruited between 2018, 2019 & 2020 have not been paid till now.
2. They were documented in January 2020 across the six geo-political zones of Nigeria waiting to be captured on the IPPIS platform for payment of their salary to commence to no avail.
3. Initially, COVID 19 was used as an excuse meanwhile our counterparts employed at the same time in other ministries and agencies were captured and have since been receiving salaries.
4. In September 2020, a circular came out in regards to the capturing but later the process was scuttled with the Head of Service of the federation and Ministry of Education pointing out irregularities and issuance of fake appointment letters.
5. This then prompted a take over of the entire process by the Office of the Head of Service of the federation. The OHSF kicked off a fresh re-documentation exercise of which only 900+ names have been invited to Abuja for re-documentation( not on zonal levels like before, but random selection).
6. In the process of travelling to and from Abuja, two newly employed teachers were lost to an accident. Others had their own near-death experiences and sad tales to tell.
7. After that phase, nothing was done until the newly employed teachers agitated to know why the delay, another scheme was launched and this time, they said they were starting with Presidential awardees of NYSC.
8. They invited about 900+ persons for re-documentation and capturing while over 800 persons were still pending for over a month now delaying the whole process.
9. The whole process has no end or likely date of 2018, 2019 and 2020 officers” and “regularized PTA Staff” to be captured.

With due respect Sir, we have families to cater for and we have lost about five (5) of our colleagues because of starvation and ill health with no payments insight. We, therefore, urge you Sir to use your good office as we make the following appeals:

Our Four Point Appeal;

1) Those who are yet to be re-documented will be called for re-documentation and capturing the same day. We cannot bear to lose any colleague as a result of constant travels. This point should be given immediate attention within one week of receipt of this letter.

2)Some persons amongst us are still expecting their letters especially those deployed in Kings College Lagos. They should also be given immediate attention within one week of the receipt of this letter.

3) Those who have already been re-documented and captured should be placed, paid their salaries and all arrears of salaries owed between November to December 31st 2021.

4) We have laboured and suffered greatly since 2019, we appeal that you give our situation accelerated attention.

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