The striking lecturers and non-academic workers of Emmanuel Alayande College of Education, Oyo town, Oyo State, have suspended their over four-month industrial action with immediate effect.
Besides, the institution’s branch of Colleges of Education Academic Staff Union (COEASU) has tendered “unreserved apology” to the management of the college for what it called the deplorable conduct of some of its members on November 1.
The institution’s academic and non-academic workers went on strike on June 28 over delayed payment of salary arrears, which the governing council is said to have decided to clear by instalments.
A communiqué indicated that the truce was brokered on Sunday at a meeting between representatives of the state government, which owns the institution, and other stakeholders in the college, at the Ministry of Education in Ibadan, the state capital.
The school management also agreed not to press criminal charges against members of the academic staff union at the centre of the “deplorable incident”.
The Special Adviser to the Governor on Education, Dr. Bisi Akin-Alabi, led the government’s team to the meeting, while the Chairman of the institution’s branch of COEASU, Mr. Olusegun Oyewumi, and other union leaders attended the meeting.
The Provost of the College, Dr. Rasak Adefabi, led the management delegation to the meeting, which was also attended by students unions’ representatives, led by the Chairman of the state’s axis of the National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS), Mr. Moronkola Teslim.
The joint communiqué, which was issued at the end of the five-hour parley, was signed by all the union leaders.
It also stated that academic activities would resume fully with immediate effect.
The communiqué reads: “…COEASU will suspend the strike on November 6, following which payment of October 2018 salary will be made to its members on the same day. That the rumour making the rounds on sacking of a number of workers was dispelled.
“That the COEASU of the college should tender a formal, unreserved apology to the Governing Council and the college management on the deplorable incident of November 1.
“As such, all proposed criminal charges will be dropped and no worker shall be victimised or disciplined as a result of the strike. That the COEASU of the college should be more civil in its approach to agitation over its grievances in the future.”
Other stakeholders at the parley were the chairmen of the institution’s branch of the senior staff union and Non-academic Staff Union (NASU), Messrs Segun Adeniji and Fatai Adebayo.
Others are: the NANS Oyo State axis Chairman, Mr. Moronkola Teslim; the college’s Students’ Union President, Mr. Afolabi Lawal, as well as the acting Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Education, Mrs. Ronke Fatoki.
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