By Adedapo Adesanya
Following concerns expressed over the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS), the federal government has assured staff of federal universities of the efficiency and potentials that it would bring to institutions in the country.
This was made clear by the Accountant General of the Federation (AGF), Mr Ahmed Idris, in a statement released via the Deputy Director, Press and Publicity, Mr Henshaw Ogubike, on Tuesday, in the nation’s capital, Abuja.
His response followed concerns noted by the Committee of Vice-Chancellors of Federal Universities, when they paid the AGF a visit recently. He assured them that all rules and peculiarities in the universities that were recognised by the government would be accommodated and implemented through IPPIS.
“All the peculiarities shall be stated, all the rules of engagement shall equally be stated; we are ready to go by the rules of engagement.
“All the rules that are recognised by the government in the universities, we will go by these rules, none will be set aside,” he said.
Mr Idris also said that the objection by the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) to IPPIS was not necessary because the federal government had met with the universities and assured them that IPPIS was not to take away the autonomy of the institutions.
He added that the major reason for implementing IPPIS was to make the management of personnel more efficient and said the practice where universities recruited staff, not minding whether their budget would accommodate such employment, was responsible for the issue of shortfall in personnel revenue.
The AGF also used the opportunity to clarify that IPPIS would help the universities solve the problem of shortfall in personnel revenue as the recruitment and remuneration of staff would be more efficient.
He then revealed that at the end of the last enrollment of university personnel on IPPIS, a total of 8,146 academic and 86,844 non-academic staff were accredited by the system, saying the figures represented more than 70 percent of the staff of federal universities.
Mr Idris urged the Vice-Chancellors to support the government on the implementation of IPPIS and other financial reform initiatives aimed at bringing transparency into the country’s education system.
Modupe Gbadeyanka