The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) has stated that it is ready to have a sit down with the Federal Government to reach an amicable solution to their industrial action.
This was according to Biodun Ogunyemi, national president of ASUU
According to TheCable, Ogunyemi explained that the strike action was necessary as a means to protest the poor funding that universities in the country have been beset with and the refusal of the government to live up to the end of their bargain which is contained in a memorandum of understanding (MoU) signed between the union and the federal government in 2017.
TheCable also reports that Ogunyemi said that there is a meeting set with the federal government delegation for 1pm on Thursday.
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The matter of the N200 billion released by the federal government in September was brought up and to this he said that while this wasn’t an issue, the problem was that the money should have been given to them in October 2017 as per the 2013 agreement.
“It would be recalled that the federal government had agreed to inject N1.3 trillion to fund universities at N 220 billion yearly for five years,” the ASUU President said.
“If government fails to fund public universities the situation on campuses may degenerate, worse than the already poor quality teaching and learning environment.”
The ASUU head also called the government’s bluff on their “no work no pay” stance stating that this would not deter lecturers as the industrial action was legal in Nigerian labour law and international conventions.