The Senior Staff Association of Nigerian Universities (SSANU) has called off its threat of an indefinite strike after the Federal Government released eight months of salary arrears owed to its members under the 2026 FGN/SSANU Agreement. The union’s National President, Comrade Mohammed Haruna Ibrahim, said the decision followed the approval and release of the funds on October 7. The move removes, for now, the risk of a shutdown of federal universities when the 14-day deadline was due to lapse around October 19.
The arrears cover January to August 2026 and relate to the Consolidated Non-Teaching Tools Allowance (CONTTA), the component through which the new agreement raises members’ pay. According to the union, the money came within two days of the ultimatum, which took effect on October 5 after its 56th National Executive Council meeting at the University of Uyo. The National Administrative Committee, acting for the council, then resolved to stand down the planned action.
SSANU said the decision reflected its commitment to “constructive engagement, peaceful dialogue and the maintenance of cordial relations with the government”. The union credited the intervention of the Minister of Education, Dr Maruf Tunji Alausa, and asked members to work with their university managements to ensure accurate payment and to report any shortfall. It did not, however, close the file. The union asked the government to “reciprocate this gesture” by paying one year of arrears from the 25 and 35 per cent salary award of 2023, as well as two months’ salaries withheld in 2022.
The agreement at the centre of the dispute was signed on June 29, 2026 at the National Universities Commission in Abuja, with effect from January 1. It concluded the renegotiation of the 2009 agreement between the government and the union, a process that dragged on for close to two decades. According to SSANU, the deal provides a 35 per cent upward review of emoluments through CONTTA, improved earned allowances, better staff training and protection of non-teaching positions. It also opens career progression up to CONTISS 15 for qualified degree holders.
Signing the deal proved easier than paying for it. In its October communiqué, SSANU said implementation remained incomplete and uneven across universities because of funding and administrative problems. The union said institutions that had started paying the new structure had done so largely from internally generated revenue, without direct cash backing from the Federal Government. In its latest statement, it also urged state governments yet to implement the agreement to clear arrears owed to members in state universities.
The two months of withheld pay date back to the 2022 strikes that crippled public universities. That year, the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) stayed out for eight months, the National Association of Academic Technologists for about five and a half months, while SSANU and the Non-Academic Staff Union of Educational and Associated Institutions (NASU) were out for four months. The government applied its no work, no pay policy to all four unions. ASUU members later received four of their eight withheld months in October 2023.
The non-teaching unions were offered a similar half settlement. In mid-2024, the Ministry of Education recommended that SSANU and NASU be paid two of their four withheld months, mirroring the ASUU arrangement. In October 2024, both unions began an indefinite nationwide strike, accusing the government of paying academic staff while leaving their members out. SSANU now says the remaining two months are still unpaid.
The 25 and 35 per cent award is a separate claim. The union said earlier this year that some vice-chancellors had fully or partially paid the approved arrears, while criticising institutions that had not. Its position is that one year of those arrears remains outstanding across the system.
The pay gap with academic staff has also shaped the union’s push. In January 2026, the government announced a renegotiated agreement with ASUU that raised academic staff emoluments by 40 per cent through a consolidated academic tools allowance. Alausa said at the time that professors would receive an additional ₦1.8 million a year, or about ₦140,000 a month. SSANU and NASU welcomed that deal but warned that any further delay in concluding their own agreements would threaten industrial peace.
NASU, which signed its own agreement on the same day as SSANU, secured a 35 per cent increase in hazard allowances and, for the first time, a ₦600,000 annual responsibility allowance for directors. Neither the government nor SSANU has disclosed the total amount released on October 7. The union also did not say whether arrears from September onward have been built into regular salaries.
SSANU said it remains committed to dialogue but expects the government to show the same goodwill by taking concrete steps on all outstanding issues across federal and state universities. The union described the prompt release as a departure from the long delays that have marked the implementation of previous agreements.