Strike: ASUU, FG in make or mar parley

The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) and the federal government will meet today, about one week after the union called out its members on a strike.

The parley, according to the union, is at the instance of the federal government.

Confirming this development, ASUU President, Professor Biodun Ogunyemi, said the lecturers are not optimistic about the outcome of the meeting which he said “will determine the seriousness of the Nigerian government towards ending the strike.”

“The government has invited us for a meeting tomorrow.  We are not sure of their seriousness because we have been discussing with them for 16 months without any result,” he said.

 On the readiness of the lecturers to call off the strike if tomorrow’s meeting swings in their favour, he said “after the meeting, we will tell members the outcome. They are the only ones who can decide to call off the strike.”

 The official also said he is not concerned about the formation of a parallel union by some aggrieved lecturers, “who have kept on teaching regardless of the strike order.”

Some lecturers at the Obafemi Awolowo University under a rival union, Congress of Nigerian Universities Academics, have been teaching despite the strike.

“ASUU is the only recognised lecturers’ body. Some persons are free to show they are annoyed but truthfully, the strike is on and all lecturers have respected it,” Ogunyemi said.

 He also denied rumours that the lecturers have accepted government’s proposal to set up an education bank, which was one of the reasons they went on strike in the first place.

The union said, “we have not accepted education banking. We were surprised on reports that we accepted it. It is a means to exploit students and make them pay tuition fee.

“Some students do not get jobs even five years after graduation and they will be asked to repay a million naira. That is selling them to slavery totally.”

 Other demands by the union include improved funding of education and improved teaching and learning conditions in the universities.

Meanwhile, the union has lashed out at Governor Kayode Fayemi of Ekiti state for “lying that Nigerian university professors earn same salary of N500, 000 as him or even more”.

 ASUU in a release signed by the Chairman, ASUU University of Ibadan chapter, Dr Deji Omole, lamented that the education policy of the President Muhammadu Buhari-led administration has brought disaster to sector.

According to him, before the administration came on board in 2015, education enjoyed above 10 percent budget.

Fayemi, had in Paris, described the ASUU strike as needless, arguing that more than any others before it, the Buhari administration has done more for the education sector.

Reacting to the governor’s claims, the union challenged him to publish salary and allowances that he collects monthly to back up transparency and accountability claims of the ruling party, adding that no newly promoted professor earns N500, 000 a month.

The ASUU chairman pointed out that a newly promoted professor in slave enclave called Nigerian universities earns below N400, 000 and will only be able to receive N500, 000 monthly after ten years of becoming a professor and this includes all allowances.

“It is sad that someone who is living on the state resources with his families and countless aides with juicy salaries will not be circumspect in thought. Fake news and propaganda have been the trade mark of the ruling APC.

“Fayemi’s utterances revealed the mental state of those ruling us. We challenge him to publish what a university professor earns as salaries and allowances and what governors earn and allowances,” he said.

 According to Omole, “if lecturers earn more than governors, why did Fayemi run away? Fayemi should tell the world how much he spent on capital grants to EKSU during his first sojourn in office.  EKSU as it is now is more of TETFUND university which was a product of ASUU struggle.”

 The union also said it would feel proud if President Muhammadu Buhari, during the many presidential Diaspora trips will be able to attract any foreign scholar with the poverty wages he pays Nigerian lecturers, saying however that the union will not like to be distracted in her struggle for the revitalisation of public education by political opportunists like Governor

 “He should rather be grateful to ASUU for the regular bailout from TETFUND. Fayemi is one of the brain drain the struggle is trying to address because if the university learning environment is conducive enough, Fayemi would have stayed in the academia rather than playing politics of destruction.

“Nigerians should ask him why he failed to pick up the appointment offered him by as an associate lecturer by University of Ibadan Senate. ASUU has not made monetary issue the main thing, but her members are entitled to allowances owed them since 2010.

“We are more concerned with a revitalised university that is adequately funded to attract foreign scholars. Fayemi should attract an international professor and offer to pay him $1500 per month and let us see how many of them he can bring to Nigeria.

“A person who bought nomination form for N22.5million to become governor and spent billions to campaign with his party listed among those who bought votes, Fayemi should tell lies to his party men who are not discerning”

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