About
110 staff whose appointments were illegally terminated in 1996 by the
management of Ahmadu Bello University have been presented with a good
news in this biting recession.
Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria
The National Industrial Court sitting in Abuja on Monday, ordered
the management of Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria to pay N2.6bn to 110
staff whose appointments were illegally terminated in 1996.
The court has also ordered the the university to immediately reinstate all the 110 staff.
Justice Peter Lifu gave the order in his judgment delivered in a suit filed by the disengaged staff against the university.
“The disengaged staff of the Ahmadu Bello University Zaria
should be paid the sum of (N2,585,130,678.21) as their entitlements from
the date of disengagement till June 2016,” he ruled.
Lifu held that the purported termination was illegal, null, void
and of no effect whatsoever. The judge therefore directed the university
to immediately reinstate the claimants as bonafide staff of the
institution.
He held that the university should comply with all the
recommendations of the 2004 and 2010 Presidential Visitation panel of
the university and ordered it to take the recommendations as binding on
it.
The 110 claimants, in 2013, instituted the suit to challenge the
alleged illegal termination of their appointments by the university
authority.
The claimants, who are both academic and non-academic staff of the
university, averred that they have variously served the institution for
over 20 years without blemish before the unlawful termination.
The claimants joined the Minister of Education, the Attorney
General of the Federation and the Minister of Justice as defendants in
the suit.
The counsel to the claimants, Mr. Femi Adedeji, expressed satisfaction with the court’s judgment.
“The judgment is very fair; they deserve their entitlements,” he said.
The counsel to the university, Mr. Aliemeke Ewere, however, refused to react to the court’s judgment.
-NAN
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