WICOE seeks FG intervention on strike

Women In Colleges of Education (WICOE) has called on the federal government to speed up negotiations with the Colleges of Education Academic Staff Union (COEASU) in order for its students to resume school.
The association made the appeal yesterday at a press conference in Abuja.
Its National President, Mrs. Mary Aibangbe, described the four-month-old strike as “disheartening,” saying that they didn’t want theirs to last long as that of ASSU and ASSUP.

She said: “We are very much concerned because we taught it was going to be a one or two weeks affair but it is running to four months now, and we do not want ours to reach that of ASSU or ASSUP which lasted 10 months.”
According to her, women are always at the receiving end in whatever problems that arise, and that their institutions are sensitive and should not be allowed to stay idle for long.

“Our institution is more sensitive because we are teacher trainers who train people and if these teachers are bedeviled by this plaque what will be the fate our children in primary, secondary and the higher institutions.
“What happens to the future of the girl child who had hopes when she was in school, but since four months of strike now the eagerness for studies will be reducing because there are other forces attracting her attention.”
She also called for the intervention of the First Lady, Dame Patience Jonathan, “as the mother of the nation.”
“We are tired of what our youths engage in and I don’t want them to continue and our First Lady is more concerned about keeping our children busy and one of the ways of keeping them busy is to make them go back to school. We are pleading with the First Lady in her magnanimity and kind heartedness to please see what she can do for us.”