NASU, SSANU suspend strike
…Students express hope about ASUU
By Deborah Onatunde
The Joint Action Committee (JAC) of the Non-Academic Staff Union of Education and Associated Institutions (NASU) and the Senior Staff Association of Nigerian Universities (SSANU) have suspended their five-month-old strike for two months.
The spokesman of JAC, Peters Adeyemi, who announced the suspension in Abuja on Saturday said the relevant organs of the two unions decided to call off the strike after the Federal Government met most of their requests.
He stated, “After very prolonged negotiations and dialogue between the two unions and the Federal Government led by the Minister of Education and after the meeting we held with the leadership of our unions, we have come to a decision to suspend the strike for the initial period of two months.
“When we presented the offers that the government made to our members, they think that since the majority of contentious issues have been substantially addressed by the government, the strike should be suspended effective this Wednesday, August 24, 2022.
“We are using this medium to say that we have an agreement that has been signed that states that the identified items should be implemented within two months. Hopefully, we will not have any reason to call out our members on strike.”
On his part, the Minister of Education, Mallam Adamu Adamu, said that their negotiations were ongoing with the Academic Staff Union Universities (ASUU), just as he expressed the hope that the university-based unions would suspend their strike very soon.
Meanwhile, following the suspension of the strike by NASU and SSANU, Nigerian students are hopeful that the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) might soon call off its ongoing strike.
Recall that ASUU and the Federal Government had last week held a meeting with the hope of negotiating on the demands of the striking university lecturers.
However, the meeting ended in a deadlock over the FG’s no work, no pay rule.
ASUU’s President, Prof. Emmanuel Osodeke, had threatened to remove the 2020/2021 and 2021/2022 academic sessions over the government’s refusal to pay lecturers their salaries for the past 6 months as well follow through on the 2018 embarked agreements for pension, overdue salaries and commissions.
Prof. Osodeke said, “If the Government does not pay us we will resume a new session from September for the 2022/2023 Academic session, and that means the 2021/2022 session doesn’t exist and so is the 2021 and 2022 jamb candidates.”
In an interview with Nigerian NewsDirect, Amos Adekiri a student of sociology hopes that ASUU would soon follow the footsteps of their counterparts by suspending its ongoing strike.
“You do not want us to go back to school, no wahala, we hope ASUU will follow the footsteps of their counterparts by also suspend their strike.”
A 300l student of Biology Education, Favour Edeko, believes the ongoing strike would soon be over. She, however, worries that even after the strike is suspended, there is tendency of more strikes as ASUU’s requests are being swept under the carpet.
“They are wasting their time not ours, as the Government have decided to turn mute on the event, even if they call the strike they will still go back since the Government is not responding to their plea,” she said.
