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Tag: ASUU strike

  • Strike: Students Groan As FG Meets ASUU On Monday

    Strike: Students Groan As FG Meets ASUU On Monday

    Some students have taken a swipe at the federal government for allegedly taking the members of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) for granted.

    The students, who spoke, described as “worrisome”, the proposed fresh strike being planned by ASUU members to protest the government’s “unfulfilled promises”.

    The Minister of Labour and Employment, Chris Ngige, has invited the leadership of the union to another meeting in order to avert the looming industrial dispute in the universities.

    Spokesman of the ministry, Charles Akpan, in a telephone interview with our correspondent, disclosed that the meeting has been scheduled to hold on Monday at the ministry’s headquarters in Abuja.

    He noted that the meeting would commence at 2:00 pm.

    According to him, the ASUU delegation would be led by its President, Prof. Emmanuel Osodeke.

    Daybreak reports that the government and the university lecturers had been fighting over the appropriate salary payment platforms to use for the university lecturers, among others.

    The last 9-month-old strike was suspended after certain agreements were reached by both parties.

    But ASUU is now accusing the federal government of violating agreements it reached with the union before they called off their strike on December 24, 2020.

    Reacting to the latest development, a student of Bayero University, Kano, Hassan Aminu, appealed to the federal government to sort out the issue of the controversial Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS) with the lecturers on time.

    Saidat Akande, a Master’s Degree student at Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, wondered why the government could not make the university system in Nigeria free from crisis.

    “What does the government want to gain in throwing Nigerian universities into an unnecessary and incessant strike?

    “Settle these lecturers once and let’s move on. In fact, I’m tired,” she lamented.

    Another student of Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Osun State, Lukman Olalekan, in a telephone interview, advised the government to ensure universities in the country remain independent.

    He added that they should be given an avenue to sell their research findings and make money from that as it is being practised in Europe and other parts of the world.

  • ASUU Threatens To Resume Strike if…

    ASUU Threatens To Resume Strike if…

    University lecturers could go on another strike after the federal government failed to implement agreements reached to suspend a strike by Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU).

    The union’s chairman at Abubakar Tafawa Balewa University, Ibrahim Inuwa, says, “Only two out of the eight items including salary shortfall and visitation panel to federal Universities have been addressed.”

    Inuwa explained that the other items that Federal Government failed to implement including earned academic allowance, funding for revitalization of public universities, proliferation of state universities, renegotiation and replacement of Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System with University Transparency and Accountability Solution.

    He added that the timeline for the release of the next tranche of EAA stipulated for May 2021 has lapsed with dead silence from FGN. To avoid further accumulation of arrears of the EAA, it was also agreed that it shall be mainstreamed into the salary. This has not been implemented

    The Chairman said that the University campuses are becoming tense and restive across the length and breadth as academics are threatening to shut down activities once again, saying, “This is coming as result of the failure of the Federal Government of Nigeria to implement many aspects of memorandum of Action (MoA) it willingly signed with ASUU that ended the last strike in December, 2020.”

    He further disclosed that the Office of the Accountant General of the Federation (OAGF) through the IPPIS office have continued to omit their members from payment of salaries while others experience serious salary amputation.

    “We are convinced this is done in connivance with the University Administration through the distortion of our members personal details. Additionally, the OAGF is not fully remitting check off dues deducted from our salaries. The ultimate goal of the OAGF appears to be doing everything humanly possible to coerce members of ASUU to enroll into IPPIS and to kill the union finally,” he said.

    Inuwa noted that It is obvious to the Union that the Office Accountant General is deliberately omitting their members from payment of Salaries and withholding check of dues as a ploy for victimization and coercion to enroll ASUU members into IPPIs, “This plague has been evident across all Federal Universities in Nigeria since February, 2020. This to us is an outright act of ingratitude on the part of the Government for the sacrifices members of ASUU are making in order to establish a progressive nation. A clear case of punishing citizens for being patriotic.”

  • ASUU awaits release of N40b earned allowance

    ASUU awaits release of N40b earned allowance

    The leadership of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) has said it is awaiting the release of the N40 billion earned allowance the Federal Government promised the union, 12 days after it called off the nine-month strike.

    The government, it said, has also failed to continue payment of the withheld salaries of its members that are not enrolled on the controversial Integrated Personnel and Payroll Information System (IPPIS) after paying two months in December.

    ASUU called of its strike on December 23, 2020, after a new deal with the government team, led by Labour and Employment Minster Chris Ngige, on December 22.

    As a sign of good faith, the government paid two months of the six months withheld salaries of ASUU members, since March last year, leaving four months arrears.

    The government, through the Office of the Accountant-General of the Federation was also supposed to continue the payment of the withheld salaries of the union members after Ngige got a special waiver from President Muhammadu Buhari to that effect.

    But an ASUU leader told The Nation on Monday in Abuja that the government had missed two timelines in the December 22, 2020 MoA with the failure to pay the N40 billion EAA and another tranche of the withheld four months salaries.

  • FG lied! We have no agreement on strike suspension date – ASUU laments

    FG lied! We have no agreement on strike suspension date – ASUU laments

    The federal government has been accused of lying by the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) on an agreement being reached on strike suspension date.

    ASUU’s National President, Prof. Biodun Ogunyemi who countered the Minister of Labour and Employment, Dr Chris Ngige on claim of the union promising to resume on December 9, 2020, stated that there is nothing in the government offer of November 27, 2020 to suggest that conclusion.

    Ogunyemi reiterated that there will be no need for strikes if government implemented the agreement they reached, and further averred that the principal officers and trustees who constituted the core of representatives of ASUU at negotiation meetings with government, were not constitutionally empowered to suspend any strike action.

    He said;

    “ASUU leadership did not reach any understanding with government to suspend the strike on December 9, 2020, and there is nothing in the government offer of November 27, 2020 to suggest that conclusion as allegedly claimed by the Minister of Labour and Employment.

    “At our last meeting in the office of the Minister of Labour and Employment on November 27, 2020, the ASUU leadership promised to faithfully present the latest government offer to its members through the established tradition.

    “The latest offer by government makes proposals on nearly all items of demand by the union with timelines. Among others, the document which was signed by the Hon. Minister of Labour and Employment, Senator Chris Ngige, contains proposals on inauguration of the reconstituted FGN-ASUU Renegotiation Committee (1st December, 2020); release of details about Visitation Panels (1st December, 2020); working on the actualisation of the release of the withheld salaries of ASUU members (Wednesday, December 9, 2020).

    “Clause 9 on the document reads, ‘Based on these conclusions reached on items 1-8, ASUU’s leadership will consult its organs with a view to suspending the ongoing strike.

    “Whatever comes out of an engagement with agents of the government is an offer which must be taken back to the branches through the various organs of the union. Views and perspectives on offers by governments are aggregated and presented to government agents as counter-offers.

    “This trade union strategy of offer and counter-offer is continually deployed until the National Executive Council (NEC) of ASUU – consisting of all recognised chairpersons – finally approves what it considers an acceptable offer from the government. It is only then that any strike action by ASUU can be suspended.

    “It was a needless crisis in the first place. It happened because government has consistently failed to faithfully implement the agreements it freely signed with the union.

    “ASUU members, as stakeholders in the Nigerian university system, are equally worried and embarrassed that those in position of authority, over the years, displayed seeming indifference to the rot and decay in Nigeria’s public universities.

    “We think it is not too late to do a rethink; we believe if there is the will, there will be a way.”

  • How ASUU strike turns A 400L University Student to become a Newspaper Vendor

    How ASUU strike turns A 400L University Student to become a Newspaper Vendor

    From Noah Ocheni, Lokoja

    A 400L Computer Science Student with the Federal University Lokoja, (FUL), Thomas Kehinde has decried the prolonged strike of Academic Staff Union  of Universities (ASUU)
    that forced him into sales of newspapers for survival.

    Kehinde in an exclusive interview with our correspondent on Wednesday, said the ASUU strike has turned him into an emergency newspaper vendor just to survive
    insisting that both the academic body and the government are playing games with the lives and future of Nigerian youths.

    “Kehinde who is from Adavi Local Government Area of Kogi State told our reporter that, “my parents fed from hand to mouth just to see me through school in pursuance of my academic dream of becoming a great computer scientist but with this unending strike of ASUU, how soon can my dream come true?” he asked.

    According to him, his hopes of graduating from the University in his four years course  in 2020 has been dashed by the tussle between  the Federal Government and the Academic Union pointing out that he decided to venture into newspaper business to avoid seating at home or engage in any social vices.

    “The last nine months have been so hectic. I thought I would be saying goodbye to the university by the end of 2020, but that hope has been shattered. Can you imagine, ASUU and the government are treating Nigerian Students as if we are not part of this country.”

    ” You would recall that, most of the people that participated in the #EndSARS protests were students. This is because they were idle.”

    “As for me, I won’t blame our leaders for treating us like trash. How many of the big men and the top government official has children in a public Nigeria University.?”

    “As for me, I will continue with my newspaper business, with the hope that the Federal Government and ASUU will come to a truce. I don’t want to drag the name of my family into the mud, so I decided to do this business for survival” he concluded.

    Although, some of my friend have been mocking me, including  some of my course mates  that I am selling newspaper,  I still don’t care. It is better to do a legitimate business of selling newspaper, than engaging in armed robbery, or kidnapping,  just to satisfy my immediate needs” he stated.

    He described the over nine old ASUU strike as unfair, appealing to the aggrieved bodies to sheath their swords and allow students return to class room.