Strike: Between ASUU and govt
According to ASUU, it went on strike because of the non- implementation of some aspects of the 2009 agreement by the government. Also, ASUU suspended a strike in January 2012 on the same issues and had since held several meetings with the government officials, according to the Chairman, ASUU University of Lagos (UNILAG) branch, Dr. […]
According to ASUU, it went on strike because of the non- implementation of some aspects of the 2009 agreement by the government.
Also, ASUU suspended a strike in January 2012 on the same issues and had since held several meetings with the government officials, according to the Chairman, ASUU University of Lagos (UNILAG) branch, Dr. Karo Ogbinaka. He said, “When the strike was suspended one and a half years ago, there was Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on the issues.”
However, apparently because students want to be in school and their parents also want them in school , anytime ASUU goes on strike people blame it and not the government.
Some people feel that since government hardly fulfills its promises, ASUU should just shrug and continue its work. It should be business as usual, is it not Nigeria? But why should we accept non fulfillment of agreements by the government as the norm, yet people are always lamenting that our universities lack so many things like hostels, libraries, laboratories and theaters.
Besides, if there are some allowances ASUU demands, it should be given or negotiated to give it some, after all some corrupt government officials steal billions of naira without blinking an eyelid. Yet these are not prosecuted.
People that can afford to, send their children to private universities in the country or abroad. Look at how Nigerian children are scrambling to go to universities in Ghana. Some do it not necessarily for the quality of education abroad, but because their children would not extend their studies due to strike actions that has become part and parcel of Nigerian universities.
Last month I attended the convocation ceremony of a private university. A parent made a short remark, saying she and her husband wanted to send their son to a private university that would not go on strike, so that he would finish his studies at the stipulated time. That was why they chose that university.
The government is always having the upper hand, it can count on the frustrations of students, parents and the society to prevail on ASUU to call off the strike, that is until the next one. An example of such sentiments is when the National Association of Nigerian Students(NANS) threatened to protest at the headquarters of ASUU.
President of NANS Yinka Gbadebo told newsmen on Wednesday in Abuja that NANS opposed the ASUU strike as the only option in getting the government to implement the MoU it signed in 2012. (But it seems it is the only language government understands).
However, it is disappointing when the NANS threatened ASUU in a cheap blackmail in my view. The students union said that it would in future oppose to some of ASUU’s demands that the government had already agreed on, such as the retirement age of academics from 65 to 70 years.
If the students really worry about their studies and the bad conditions of their universities, one would have thought, they would stage a protest at the National Assembly and other relevant government agencies to make the government do its part in salvaging the education sector. But no, the so-called students’ leaders behaved like political ‘rented crowd’ to make the right noises for stipend. I hope our children have not yet degenerated into this lowly pit.
Also on Wednesday, the Federal Government appealed to ASUU to call off the strike, at the Federal Executive Council meeting chaired by Vice President Mohammed Namadi Sambo.
Briefing journalists after the meeting, the Minister of Interior, Abba Moro, said the council had resolved to establish negotiations with the striking lecturers at the cabinet level to ensure a lasting solution.
He said the council was urging ASUU to reconsider the use of strikes to resolve grievances against government and that the union should consider other means of getting government to meet its demands.
Moro said the government was fully aware of the challenges facing the education sector which has seen students seeking for ‘greener pasture’ in foreign educational institutions, including those in neighbouring Benin Republic. Nevertheless, the government was not chided for reneging on its agreement with ASUU, that was the root cause of the strike. It is high time government meet up to its expectation, pitching the public against ASUU will no longer hold.