TheNewsGuru

Tag: Universities shut down

  • ASUU STRIKE: FG to meet with ASUU executives today, as strike enters 183 days

    ASUU STRIKE: FG to meet with ASUU executives today, as strike enters 183 days

    As the ongoing strike action of the Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU, enters 183 days today, the Federal Government would meet with the union executives on Tuesday, August 16, to discuss its decision.

     

    This was disclosed by the national president of ASUU, Prof. Emmanuel Osodeke, on Channels Television’s Politics Today programme, monitored by TheNewsGuru.com on Monday.

     

    Recall that since the end of the renegotiation meeting led by Prof. Nimi Briggs, the government had not made effort to discuss its decision with the union’s executives.

     

    Likewise, after the submission of the ASUU report by the Briggs committee, the president gave the Minister of Education, Mallam Adamu Adamu a two-week ultimatum to address the demands of ASUU.

     

    However, the two weeks elapsed three weeks ago, yet, nothing was done to forestall an extension of the strike by one month strike, which started on August 1, 2022.

     

    As such, Osodeke said the union was willing to call off the strike if the Federal Government agreed to its demands at today’s meeting.

     

    He said, “If we go into that meeting tomorrow and the government says, what you have bargained for, we are willing to sign, the strike will be called off.”

     

    In an earlier interview, Osodeke condemned the fraudulent activities which the government used the university unions rejected the Integrated Payroll and Personnel information system to commit.

     

    He said, ‘’We have been shouting all along that IPPIS is a fraud, we have told them that for 16 years they siphoned our money with IPPIS, and they punished our members because of it. Now, they know, some foreign bodies forced it on the people.’’

     

    ASUU commenced its ongoing strike on February 14, 2022, after the Federal Government refused to meet some of its demands including, the release of revitalization funds for universities, renegotiation of the 2009 FGN/ASUU agreement, release of earned allowances for university lecturers, and deployment of the UTAS payment platform for the payment of salaries and allowances of university lecturers.

  • STRIKE: FG to resume talks with ASUU next week

    STRIKE: FG to resume talks with ASUU next week

    The Minister of Labour and Employment, Senator Chris Ngige, has said talks with the striking Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) will resume next week.

     

    Disclosing this on Friday, while making the opening remarks at a meeting between the government side and the striking National Association of Academic Technologists (NAAT) in his office, Ngige noted that the resumed talks would be with a view to ending the prolonged closure of Nigerian public universities.

     

    Ngige asserted that multiple industrial disputes in the education sector could have been averted if the unions in the sector took advantage of his open-door policy like those in the health sector, which he said culminated in the peace currently enjoyed in that sector.

     

    Ministry of Labour and Employment, Patience Onuobia, the minister who also decried the rivalry between the education unions, noted that everybody is important in the university system.

     

    He assured that the government was tackling all the disputes in the education sector holistically, knowing full well that none of the unions could function effectively without the others.

     

    He said: “If you are from any union, you don’t need to book an appointment to see me. The doctors started using that advantage and JOHESU also did the same. That is why the Health Sector is quiet.

     

    “But the education unions don’t take advantage of my open door policy. We don’t have to cry over spilt milk. Let us look at your issues to see the ones we can handle immediately, the ones we can do in the medium term and the ones we can do in the long term.

  • STRIKE: ASUU warns FG not to be misdirected by NITDA officers

    STRIKE: ASUU warns FG not to be misdirected by NITDA officers

    The Academic Staff Union of Universities, Lagos Zone, has warned the Federal Government not to allow itself to be misinformed and misdirected through the officers of the National Information Technology Development Agency, NITDA, in order to end the ongoing strike.

     

    ASUU noted that the rejection of University Transparency and Accountability Solution, UTAS, by NITDA will continue to elongate the strike action.

     

    The union declared that the strike would not be suspended until the government addresses the adoption of UTAS, implements the renegotiated agreement, and pays all outstanding allowances.

     

    Speaking at a press briefing held at the Federal University of Agriculture, Abeokuta, on Tuesday, the coordinator of ASUU Lagos Zone, Adelaja Odukoya, insisted that the UTAS proposed by the union passed the test and quality assurance requirements, having scored 99.3 per cent.

     

    Odukoya described the rejection as an attempt to play politics with the public universities.

     

    He maintained that the statement of the NITDA discrediting the union’s efforts on the University Transparency and Accountability Solution is false and a deliberate attempt to misinform the public.

     

    He called on Nigerians to join the union in the fight to meet their demands.

     

    He said, “We, however, wish to draw the attention of all concerned to the deliberate misinformation and disinformation of the public by the National Information Technology and Development Agency on the state of the integrity test and adoption of the University Transparency and Accountability Solution by the government.

     

    “The utterances of the NITDA spokesperson are capable of deliberate elongation of the ongoing strike action, suppose the government allows itself to be misinformed and misdirected through the managerial incompetence of the NITDA officers. In that case, our union considers it the peak of insensitivity to the plight of the universities, including staff, students, and indeed the country.

     

    “Nonetheless, it is the considered opinion of our union that we owe the Nigerian people the onerous responsibility of providing the truth in discharging our patriotic duty as Nigerian Academic and the intellectual conscience of the Nigerian state.

     

    “ASUU, therefore, wants the Nigerian public to call the DG, NITDA to order on the point of integrity not to play politics and vendetta with the future of Nigeria and that of our public universities as National treasures and collective patrimony of all Nigerian citizens. We are convinced that the DG of NITDA is only out to carry out the hatchet job of a Minister whose professional fraud was challenged by our union.

     

    “ASUU wants to inform you that the current strike action will not be suspended until the government addresses the adoption of UTAS, implement the renegotiated agreement, pay all outstanding allowances without prejudice to the donation of $1 million to Afghanistan and fulfill all other issues contained in the Memorandum of Action signed with our Union.”