ASUU puts strike on hold, gives FG two-week ultimatum to implement agreements

Sodiq Adelakun

The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) has announced that a strike is not imminent if the Federal Government implements the agreements reached within the next two weeks.

Professor Emmanuel Osodeke, President of ASUU, made this known in an interview with newsmen on Monday.

Recall that ASUU had threatened to embark on strike over the non-implementation of agreements reached with the federal government.

The Minister of Education, Professor Tahir Mamman, had invited the union for a meeting on June 26 to deliberate on the lingering issues affecting universities and to avert the planned strike.

According to Osodeke, none of the agreements reached with the Federal Government has been implemented. He emphasized that the union is willing to give the government a two-week grace period to fulfill its promises before taking any action.

The ASUU president urged the government to take concrete steps to address the issues affecting the university system to avoid a strike.

“At the meeting called by the Minister of Education, we agreed that after two weeks, we will meet to see the progress the government has made.

“We will also see what we will do next if the government fails to implement the agreements reached.

“The meeting in the next two weeks is to see what they have done which will inform our decision,” he said.

The ASUU president said some of the demands included the non-implementation of the 2009 re-negotiated agreements.

He said the agreements had lingered for over six years and the government was yet to implement them.

Osodeke said the academic allowances due to their members had also accumulated for over six years and nothing had been done about it

On the issue of revitalisation fund, he said they agreed on the NEEDs Assessment Report to raise N200 billion yearly, for five years.

“Since 2013, only one has been paid. We need revitalisation funds to upgrade our universities to standard so that we can have students and lecturers from outside the country,” he said.

Oshodeke added that the government was yet to stop the proliferation of universities adding that many new universities were being approved without funds to run them.

He said the government was also yet to exit the university salary payment from Integrated Personnel and Payroll Information System! (IPPIS) as approved by the Federal Executive Council in January.

He said their members were still being paid by IPPIS against the directive by the FEC.