ASUSS Wins NUT In Court Over Right To Association

The National Industrial Court of Nigeria (NICN), Yenagoa Division, has ruled that teachers in Bayelsa State operating under the auspices of the Academic Staff Union of Secondary Schools (ASUSS) have the constitutional right to form an association to promote and protect their welfare and interest.

Justice Bashar Alkali, the presiding judge, gave the judgment in a case with suit number NICN/YEN/37/2019 filed before the court by the state chapter of the Nigeria Union of Teachers (NUT) against ASUSS.

The NUT had dragged the break-away teachers before the NICN seeking, among other prayers, a perpetual injunction restraining them from operating under the name of ASUSS as an unregistered trade union.

Justice Alkali, however, held that since ASUSS was duly registered under the Companies and Allied Matters Act, the NUT had no right to collect check-off dues from members of ASUSS without written consent.

He also stated that the NUT had no power to grant a waiver, regulate or accredit ASUSS and that its demand, therefore, was invalid.

Parts of the judgement read, “there is nothing in the Trade Union Act, Labour Act or Pension Reform Act that empowers the NUT Bayelsa State Chapter to regulate or accredit other associations with the same objective.

“There is no evidence of the fact that members of ASUSS are members of NUT and no document to show that NUT obtained the consent of each member of ASUSS to the deduction of a percentage as check-off dues.

“Therefore, ASUSS acted within their constitutional rights informing the association to care for the interest and welfare of their members even though not as a Trade Union.

“Any deduction of check-off dues to the NUT without consent of the person whose wage is to be deducted is a nullity as same lack validity for failure to fulfil the said condition.”

The state chairman of ASUSS, Pedro Igbudu, said he was happy over the legal victory, adding that “it is a judgment we have been expecting.”

But the state chairman of NUT, Richman Otobo, declined comment on the judgment.

In 2017, many secondary school teachers had withdrawn their membership from the NUT and formed ASUSS, accusing the union’s leadership of not protecting and promoting the interest of its members and requesting their employees to stop deducting check-off dues from their salaries in favour of NUT.

As a result, the NUT dragged the defendants, Igbudu Pedro, Ibietan Simeon, Ohis Quincy, Godspower Nancy and others to the NICN in 2019 seeking a perpetual injunction restraining them from forming ASUSS, alleging that the association was harassing members of the NUT for paying their check-off dues.