ABUJA – Meeting between Federal Government and leadership of the Academic Staff Union of Universities has been adjourned till Thursday (February 7, 2019).
Yesterday’s meeting makes it the 9th time the striking lecturers are meeting with the Minister of Labour and Employment, Dr. Chris Ngige, to resolve industrial action which has lingered for almost three months.
Speaking to journalists at the end of the meeting, the labour minister and the ASUU President noted that they were making progress.
Both parties, however, refused to give specific details, stating that the press will be briefed after next Thursday’smeeting
Until the adjourned meeting, ASUU has insisted that there is no going back on its ongoing nationwide strike.
The striking lecturers insisted that the Federal Government must show a strong commitment to funding and revitalisation of universities before they would suspend the industrial action.
Prof. Ogunyemi insisted that the issue of universities revitalisation was very important to the union that it cannot suspend the industrial action if left untouched.
“The most critical of all is revitalisation,” he continued, “revitalisation is central to our work as academics and unless that area is addressed, members will have issues with ongoing action.”
“They gave us their response to our proposals, there were still grey areas that we are trying to sort out. So, when we finish those areas, you will know the full outcome”, he told journalists.
However, the minister of labour, Dr. Ngige, was hopeful that the union would suspend the strike soon.
According to him, the government has demonstrated commitment by way of disbursing money through the Tertiary Education Trust (TET) fund to revitalise public universities.
“We have started defraying the end allowances there, we have also released N15.4 billion for the shortfall in payment of salaries, and we have also agreed today to fund revitalisation”.
“We are going to expend some money there; this is irrespective of the fact that government has released from the TETfund account about N163 billion”, Ngige told reporters.
The minister added that the meeting would reconvene at the instance of ASUU which said it needed to consult its members before taking the next step.
The union went on strike in November 14, 2018 following the alleged inability of the government to address its demands.
ASUU is also concerned about what they described as poor funding of Nigerian Universities; alleged plot to increase students’ fees; introduction of an education bank; and non-implementation of previous agreements, among other issues.
