By Auwal Ahmed Ibrahim, Goronyo
The working environment of Nigeria is not favorably because of many issues that revolve around the salary of workers.

While, on its part, the Federal Government of Nigeria is coming up with changes and revolution in the working system to make the working condition stronger and viable as it always says to calm the nerves of worker. But, the condition of the work is suffocating.
The previous regime of Muhammad Buhari implemented the IPPIS system in 2007 with the core mission to eradicate the issue of ghost workers and provide a sustainable working force for Nigerian workers, and without delay pay salaries. But, no long after the introduction of the IPPIS payment system workers kicked against the system and keep demanding for alternative.
Workers, specifically, the Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU realized the fault of IPPIS in accurate payment of salary, non-efficiency, non- reliability and non-affordability for the workers.
The Academic Staff Union of Nigeria University (ASUU) keep rising its voice against the IPPIS system and formally requested for pullout from it, but the past government refused to grant approval to its demand until when the present Government came with sweet promises for the Nigerian tertiary workers.
The present government promised to remove all tertiary staff from the platform, yet the promise is in limbo and the government had pushed the tertiary workers to another New IPPIS salary payment system instead of the GIFMIS platform. Though ASUP agreed to stay on IPPIS system.
The IPPIS mission became dead and didn’t meet its target on identifying ghost workers and not giving the best for workers, the government had for many times complained of the IPPIS malfunction.
To track workers earning salary for not doing the job for it, the Accountant General of the Federation availed Nigerian Federal workers to validate their IPPIS as a measure to track ghost workers in Nigeria and diaspora.
Recently, the Accountant General of the Federation (OAGF) via a circular signed by Dr. (Mrs) Oluwatoyin Madei directed all employees registered on the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS) to update their details from Monday, July 1, 2024, to Wednesday, July 31, 2024, and “upon successful submission of the update, employees are expected to print three (3) copies of the completed record, update summary page which will be used in the future for physical staff verification exercises.”
The Accountant General stressed that failure to comply with the directive would result in suspension from the payroll; meaning that workers will stop getting their salary.
But, it is good for the Accountant General to know that the smart application for the verification task is not functioning and not accessible while the dateline is approaching to expiration.
For the good of both sides, our trade unions and the mother union; Nigerian Labor Congress should to come in to rescue million of workers that may lose their jobs because the IPPIS validation application is not responding.
Unions should seek for extension of the validation period, improvement of the validation software, and inquire for the reason of incorporation of our Tax Identification Number (TIN) as criteria for the validation which was not provided in the initial capturing of the IPPIS.
The IPPIS crises is causing more damages than good for the Nigerian tertiary workers, where many workers ‘japa’ to outside institutions.
At the present, Federal Staff workers in Kaduna state are grumbling of paying huge tax bigger to the Federal Government charges because of the IPPIS system. There is need for trade unions to make inquiry on this and address the marginal treatment for the good of workers.
ASUP union should make sure it verifies the extortion of the Pay-As-You-Earn (PAYE) system and make sure that every staff is paying the appropriate charging amount as the charges dwindle. The PAYE tax rate progresses from 7 percent to 24 percent of taxable income, but charges fluctuate.
To make education stronger in Nigeria, the Federal Government of Nigeria must put all hands on deck and listen to the calls of workers’ unions to save the future of Nigerian education if not ‘japa’ will continue to take away value of our education, while unions must get involve to address these issues base on the constitutional order as we wait to hear the side of our unions on the IPPIS validation exercise.
Auwal Ahmed Ibrahim, Goronyo is a staff of Kaduna Polytechnic, Dep’t of Mass Communication.