The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) has announced that the ongoing its 10-month long nationwide strike has been suspended conditionally, following the payment of withheld salaries to lecturers.

In a post from their official Twitter handle, @ASUUNGR on Wednesday December 23 2020, the union announced the suspension of the current strike, which has lasted for 10 months following series of closed door meetings between them and the federal government.

#BREAKING: ASUU suspends 10months strike conditionally.

Congratulations to all undergraduates. #ASUU pic.twitter.com/bRK6n7dRwB

— Official_ASUU (@ASUUNGR) December 23, 2020

During a meeting, one of the criteria set by ASUU to call off the strike was the payment of at least 2 months salary that was suspended following the strike action, as a show of faith on the Government’s part.  According to an undisclosed source “Part of the conditions given by the lecturers to call off the strike are that N70 billion offered by the federal government for earned allowances and revitalisation fund should be paid into the accounts of various universities’ bursaries by Tuesday. Also, the government is expected to have paid at least two months’ salaries by Tuesday. We resolved to mandate the ASUU leadership to announce the suspension of the strike once they are satisfied that the conditions have been met.”

Recall that ASUU proceeded on its initial two weeks warning strike, following the Federal Government’s refusal to pay lecturers who were not part of the Government’s Integrated Personnel and Payroll Information System (IPPIS), following an argument that the IPPIS did not take into consideration the way universities operate. Negotiations during the past ten months have been centred on ASUU’s insistence that its members would not register on the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS).

With the Academic Staff Union of Universities set to call off the strike, schools would have to take steps to ensure Covid-19 compliance to protect students and lecturers, as the government is also taking steps to curb the spread of the pandemic and some nation’s even going into the second stage of lockdown.