The Oyo State forum, Ladoke Akintola University of Technology (LAUTECH) chapter, Ogbomoso has described the claims by Osun State Government that N472million has been released to the institution as misleading and incorrect.
It reiterated its position that the joint ownership of the institution is a failed experiment and it should be brought to a close peacefully without further delay.
The workers said that the N222 million of the N472million was given to the Teaching Hospital in Osogbo, adding that it had nothing to do with workers’ salaries because the two were separate bodies with their separate boards.
The group consists of workers in the institution who are indigenes of Oyo State.
In a statement signed by the Chairman of the forum, Chief Adeniyi Adediran and Secretary, Mr. Ebenezer Aremu, the forum said lumping the two together is mischievous and unhelpful.
“The question the public should ask Osun State is why Oyo State never lumped the funding of the Teaching Hospital in Ogbomoso with the salary issue in LAUTECH, just as Osun is doing? This attitude will complicate the crisis, rather than resolve it if Osun does not desist from this needless propaganda. It is too petty, to say the least.
“The salary wage bill of LAUTECH presently stands at between N410 and N415 million per month. If Osun State just released N250 million, it means that it has merely paid only one month partly for the university to look for the balance.
“This fact lays bare the wrong impression being created in the mind of the public that Osun State has cleared the debts it owes workers of LAUTECH.
“If the administration struggles to pay just August 2019 salary with the release, we are still very deep in the woods. This sure, cannot resolve the crisis.”
Giving a breakdown of the debt profile of Oyo and Osun states, the forum said: “The total indebtedness to LAUTECH stood at N12, 480, 370, 257:31 as at August, 2019.
“The breakdown of this indebtedness per state stands at N4, 805, 371, 803.68 for Oyo and N7, 674, 998, 453.63 for Osun. It is instructive to state here that while that debt profile remains constant for Oyo till the end of 2019, that of Osun, whose turn is to pay from July to December would have increased to N8, 854, 028, 803 if it continues to accumulate the debt.”
