Oyo Teachers Begin Warning Strike

Members of the Oyo State chapter of the Nigeria Union of Teachers on Wednesday commenced a warning strike.

The industrial action which paralysed academic activities in public schools in the state was a protest against the state government’s failure to implement the 27.5 per cent salary increase.

The NUT had directed his members to observe the warning strike every Wednesday when all efforts aimed at making the government implement the pay rise failed.

Our correspondent who went round some public schools in Ibadan, the state capital, on Wednesday, observed a total compliance with the directive.

Some students who reported to school in the morning were sent back home by the striking teachers. Some of the students who refused to go back home were seen playing football in the their schools’ premises while others were loitering the streets.

The resort to industrial action was last week announced by the state Secretary of the union, Mr. Olu Abiala.

Apart from the warning strike slated for every Wednesday, all the teachers are also expected to wear black attires on Thursdays until when the government would meet its obligation.

Abiala also handed down a 21-day ultimatum to the state government to implement the salary increase or face total strike.

In a communiqué which directed the teachers to embark on the strike, the national leadership of the union commended the state governors who had effectively carried out the agreement reached between the union and the Nigeria Governor’s Forum in August 2008, but frowned at the governors who have reneged on the said agreement.

As a result of non-compliance with the agreement, the conference had directed teachers in the affected states to resume the suspended strike action without further notice until the package was paid.

Abiala told journalists that in as much as teachers would not want to toy with the future of students in the state, the union had no power to reverse the directive given by the conference which is the highest in the country.