Strike: FG/ASUU negotiation meeting deadlocked

…As varsity teachers flay Govt over failure to improve quality of education
The meeting between the Federal Government and the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) which held on Thursday ended without resolution of the nationwide strike by ASUU.

Recall that ASUU went on nationwide strike on November 4, 2018 over its demands for improved funding of universities and welfare of lecturers.

Thursday’s meeting began 3p.m and ended 8:15 p.m.

The Minister of Labour and Employment, Chris Ngige, said government’s discussion with ASUU will continue next week.

Ngige earlier said the meeting with the ASUU was late in coming due to the minimum wage negotiation.

He appealed to the union to put the interests of student as who are at the receiving end into consideration.

ASUU president, Professor Biodun Ogunyemi, said the union have tendered its request and also said the meeting has been adjourned till next week.

According to him, no date has been fixed but “we will communicate the date to you tomorrow,” he told waiting journalists.

He said the union was forced to call the strike after its plea for the implementation of the 2009 agreement fell on deaf ears.

“Our meeting with the education minister in May and September to remind him about Federal Government promises to implement the agreement yielded no result,” he said.

Ogunyemi earlier said the government had promised to take action on issues raised in the last MOU signed by the two parties but “it does appears that Federal Government is dribbling the union.”

Speaking earlier on Thursday before the meeting went into technical session, Prof. Ogunyemi, berated the Federal Government over failure to improve the quality of Government-owned institutions across the country which has aided the proliferation of low quality private schools.

According to him, the Federal Government has failed to revamp the quality of education in Nigeria and to aid the government-owned institutions to the benefit of the privately owned institutions.

“What we see now is that Government medium suffer due to the fact that the sitting Government has allowed the private schools enjoy,” he stated.

The ASUU members at the meeting who rejected every Kola presented to them by the Labour Ministry, stated that a country like Rwanda has revamped its educational programme after exiting from war in 2004 and now is standing as one of the countries with high quality educational programme.

The leadership of ASUU reminded that the reason for embarking on strike action is predicated upon the urgent need for the Federal Government to address its abandoned memorandum of understanding signed with Federal Government.

He said: “We are not just happy to embark on strike action but we have no option owing to an urgent need for education transformation.

You can recall that most of our demands are dated back to 2001 with no remedy. We have so many cases which includes the University of Ilorin verification and academic allowances which after six months have not been paid.

Other cases in Kogi University where our union members are being prosecuted for unionism activities”.

Further continuing, ASUU warned of the impending danger of proliferation of private universities across the state and local governments.

“It appears every state and local government want to esterblish a private universities across Nigeria even those that cannot be funded. This is the beginning of the death of education in Nigeria. We know that some of the states’ universities cannot just be funded by the states let alone privately owned institutions”.

He also highlighted the failure of Government in payment of Education Academic Allowances (EAA) which the Government has failed to pay after six weeks of promise.

Meanwhile, welcoming the ASUU delegation to the meeting, Labour minister, Senator Chris Ngige, said that reaching agreement with ASUU is never late.

“It is never late and we better be late than never as problems can be solved because it is just human issues. I want us in the spirit of our children who study here in Nigeria to see that they go back to school,” he said.

Senator Ngige further noted that he as a Minister of Labour see reasons why the students should go back to school to further continue their process.

“I want us in the spirit of our children and I can say here that none of my children studies abroad. All of them study in Nigeria here, you can now see why I’m also being affected”.