Date: 2019-11-21

Teachers under the Kwara State Universal Basic Education Board (SUBEB) yesterday urged Governor AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq to pay their four months' salary arrears.

The teachers, who converged on the Asa Dam secretariat of the Nigeria Union of Teachers (NUT) in Ilorin around 10am, proceeded from there to the House of Assembly to table their case.

The teachers said that the AbdulRazaq administration inherited the arrears from the former government of Abdulfatah Ahmed.

Spokesman for the teachers, Mallam Abdulwahab Abubakar, told newsmen that the teachers had tabled their plight before the members of the House of Assembly for intervention.

He said that the lawmakers thereafter invited the leadership of NUT for negotiation.

Abubakar hailed the governor for the payment of the state's counterpart fund of the Universal Basic Education Council (UBEC), retention of sunset teachers and releasing of running grants to agencies and parastatals shortly after assumption of office.

Said he: "In fairness, you have recorded tremendous, indelible and unprecedented achievements within your short period in office. However, our other demands include better life for retired teachers, conducive learning environment, regular promotion of teachers in SUBEB and Teaching Service Commission (TESCOM) and roundtable discussion with NUT, as we have a selfless, visionary and non-partisan chairman now.

"The former government inflicted teachers under SUBEB with untold hardship and excruciating poverty. We are very much aware that you have been working tirelessly to normalise a lot of abnormalities in the state, but SUBEB teachers are extremely hungry.

"As you have ameliorated the suffering and bring succour to the lives of the workers in the state Colleges of Education, College of Arabic and Islamic Legal Studies and the state Water Corporation, we urge you to do the same for us. God in his infinite mercies shall use you and your good office to banish hunger among teachers and the entire Kwarans."