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Lecturers and students of Akwa Ibom State Polytechnic, Ikot Osurua, were yesterday, stranded as non-academic staff members barricaded all the gates leading to the institution, preventing lecturers and students from having access to the campus.
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It was gathered that students and lecturers clustered at the gate, while security men refused them entry for academic activities. A placard was pasted at the gate with the inscription: “Please come and salvage the situation by directing the implementation of 65 years retirement age.”
Students turned the security hall at the polytechnic’s main gate into the classroom, while waiting for lecturers before a senior security officer ordered them to enter the school so that the situation would not degenerate.
President of the Students Union Government (SUG), George Inyene Geoffrey, refused to comment on the incident and could not also address the stranded students at the gate.
Reacting to the incident, one of the lecturers, who pleaded anonymity, said that the non-academic staff strike at Akwa Ibom State Polytechnic is a case of jealousy against the academic staff members who were granted 65 years as retirement age.
He argued that the non-academic staff is just an arm of the workforce in the institution, adding that they have gone too far to lock the school gate barring staff and students from having access.
“In the university system, professors are given 70 years as retirement age. Other academic staff are given 65 years. The other five years is for research and book writing to allow them to give back to the academic community their experiences over the years before they retire.”
(Brief 3)
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