Pix: AGF, Mr. Ahmed Idris
BY ONEKA AJUMOBI ONOCHIE
The Accountant-General of the Federation, Mr. Ahmed Idris, has enjoined the National Executive members of ASUU, NASU, SSANU and NATT to embrace coming on board the Integrated Personnel Payment Information System (IPPIS) as it is for the good of the nation.
The AGF who was represented by the Director, IPPIS, Mr. Olugbenga Olufehinti, at the interactive meeting with the Union Executives explained that the essence of the meeting was to seek the cooperation of stakeholders to achieve a seamless enrolment in compliance with the presidential directive which is geared toward transparency and accountability for good governance.
He buttressed his point by bringing to the notice of the stakeholders that IPPIS has the capacity to accommodate over two million of Federal Government employees and flexible enough to accommodate all peculiarities of the universities, as the case may be, stating that it is already in the public domain, with IPPIS presently having a current staff count of 755, 422 from 561 MDAs as against 235,858 in 2015.
According to the AGF, the tremendous increase in enrolment, has created a cumulative savings of over N273,809,842,071.99 (Two Hundred and Seventy-Three Billion, Eight Hundred and Nine Million Eight Hundred and Forty -Two Thousand, Seventy-One Naira, Ninety-Nine Kobo) on IPPIS platform between 2017 and 2018 which would have been lost but now available for government to deploy to other uses.
The AGF further explained that it is worth mentioning that the centralized payroll will be prepared by the individual university but coordinated by IPPIS while the total management of the human resources rests squarely with the universities, adding that this will not, in any way, compromise the autonomy of the universities.
Similarly, he said, all deductions such as PAYE, NHF, NHIS, Check-off dues, etc. deducted from staff salaries are remitted to appropriate accounts as and when due, and in addition, the unions stand to gain more as the system is transparently run.
According to the AGF, “It is my belief that the university community being the bedrock of knowledge, centre of reforms that always strives for probity, transparency and accountability for good governance, will help in bringing to bear all these rare qualities in the implementation of IPPIS,” he stressed, adding that the centralized payroll will be prepared by the individual university but coordinated by IPPIS while the total management of the human resources rests squarely with the universities, assuring the unions that they will not compromise the autonomy of the universities.
Mr. Ahmed, through the Director, concluded by urging all involved to ask relevant questions from the drivers of the scheme which would be gladly answered as well as have an open mind towards the course as the engagement continues.
Also speaking, the Executive Secretary of National Universities Commission (NUC), Prof. Abubakar Rasheed, told the union members that the issue of tax would be uniform across the country, adding that all the universities would negotiate their taxes by themselves.