KEHINDE FAJOBI
Governor of Kaduna State, Nasir El-Rufai has threatened to sack all lecturers of Kaduna State University (KASU) if they continue to participate in the industrial action by the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU).
El-Rufai, who spoke on a radio programme in Kaduna, said he would declare their positions vacant if they failed to return to work, saying KASU lecturers had no reason to be on strike because ASUU had a problem with the federal government, not the state government.
The governor also threatened to stop the salaries of lecturers who joined the strike and have the salaries already paid after they joined the strike refunded to the state.
He said, “The Acting Vice Chancellor has assured me that they will resume, but I have asked them to find out if they actually resumed work, because I initially instructed that their salary be stopped. But I was later told they didn’t join the strike, so I asked that it should be investigated and those that collected salary and joined the strike will be asked to refund the salary.
“This is because Nigeria’s law says ‘no work, no pay’. This is the law. So whoever joined the strike will not be paid a salary. We have been telling the KASU lecturers that they have no problem with the State government. ASUU’s problem is with the Federal government. Therefore, why will our staff who have no problems with us join the strike?
“If this continues, I will wake up one day to sack them all, I swear to God. We will sack them all and declare their positions vacant on the pages of newspapers. They once did the same thing and we gave them warning, now they repeated it. I’m only waiting to receive the report from the commissioner for education. I swear to God, we will sack all those that joined the strike if they refuse to resume work”.