ASUU divided over move to call off strike

ASUU divided over move to call off strike
on november 12, 2013 at 12:39 am in news
By Taye Obateru, OLA AJAYI, IBADAN, LAJU
ARENYEKA & IKENNA ASOMBA
The hope that the four month old strike by the
Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU, may be
called off this week, following President Goodluck
Jonathan’s intervention last week, may be dashed
as the 61 chapters of the union are divided over the
move to call off the strike.
President Jonathan held a meeting with the
leadership of ASUU last week, where he made
some offers which ASUU was expected to take to
their members for deliberation with the hope that it
will pacify them into resuming academic activities
this week.
Congresses of the 61 chapters of the union were
therefore held, yesterday, while the National
Executive Council, NEC, meeting will hold tomorrow
in one of the northern universities.
The outcome of the union’s congresses indicated
that there was disagreement on the need to call off
the strike.
Vanguard gathered that while some ASUU chapters
were ready to suspend the strike in the light of the
President’s intervention, others insisted that they
will continue the strike due to what they described
as their distrust for the government.
It was learnt that while the University of Lagos,
UNILAG, resolved to suspend the strike, chapters
like the University of Ibadan, UI; University of Benin,
UNIBEN; University of Calabar, UNICAL; University
of Jos, UNIJOS and the Lagos State University,
LASU, said the strike must continue, arguing that
the Federal Government could not be trusted to fulfil
its promise of injecting over N1.1 trillion to
universities in the next five years.
Voting at UNIJOS
Members UNIJOS chapter, yesterday, voted
overwhelmingly for the strike to continue.
After receiving briefings on what transpired at last
week’s meeting of the union’s representatives with
President Goodluck Jonathan and after going
through copies of the resolution of the meeting, 194
members voted for the strike to continue while 80
voted for a suspension.
Sources told Vanguard that after hours of debate by
those for and against the continuation of the strike,
it was obvious that majority felt that the meeting
with the president did not achieve much.
Those who spoke in favour of the strike to continue
wondered why the strike should be called off on the
basis of pleas and verbal promises by the
president, when the government is allegedly
reputed for not to honoring agreements.
They were said to have argued that the suffering by
students and members in the last four months
would be a waste if something concrete did not
come out of the strike to improve the situation in
universities.
It was further gathered that those for the
suspension of the strike spoke passionately on the
need to consider the impact of the strike on
students and the gesture from President Jonathan,
who met personally with ASUU leaders and pleaded
with them to suspend the strike.
A few of them were quoted as saying it was better
to suspend the strike and find other ways of
pursuing their demands so as not to lose the
support of the people.
It was learnt that the Branch ASUU Chairman, Dr.
David Jangkham, after announcing the result of the
voting, said it would be taken to the national body
which would collate the referendum on the issue
from various chapters to come up with a position on
whether the strike would be suspended or
sustained.
A member, who spoke on condition of anonymity,
expressed fears that the referenda in other
branches might follow the same trend “if the
briefing we got here is what they got.”
UNILAG
A source at University of Lagos, UNILAG, chapter,
told Vanguard that the debate at its congress was
on whether to end or suspend the strike.
He said: “We eventually moved to suspend the
strike and end it only when the President pumps in
the first N220 billion into the universities in January
2014.
“Although this is not totally in line with the 2009
agreement, we feel that we can suspend the strike
out of respect for the President. We just want to
give him the benefit of doubt, and hope that he
fulfills his promise.”
LASU
At Lagos State University, LASU, one of the
executive members of ASUU, who spoke to
Vanguard on condition of anonymity, affirmed that
though the chapter was not averse to the proposal
of President Jonathan, but the consensus at its
congress was that ASUU should not just be a
monitoring body when the fund is finally injected.
He said: “After our congress, which lasted several
hours, it was the resolve of our chapter that the
strike should not be called off, because we are
uncomfortable with the fact that the Federal
Government has said that ASUU will just be a
monitoring officer, while the Minister of Education
will be the implementation officer.
“We argued that we must be part and parcel of how
the funds are managed and what they have
earmarked for within the period of five years.
“How can we know if the Ministry of Education and
other authorities are prudently spending the funds
for the proposed projects if ASUU is not part of the
management committee? So, our position is that the
strike should not be called off.”
LASU’s internal issues
The source added that LASU chapter of ASUU may
embark on its local action, after the national strike is
suspended or called off if the university’s Governing
Council and the State Government fail to adequately
address some of its local issues, which border on
members’ welfare and a reduction in the
institution’s tuition fees.
He said: “It is our resolve at the congress that if the
state government and the university’s Governing
Council, which is meeting on Wednesday, fail to
address our local issues adequately, we shall
embark on local actions.
“The university management has wasted four
months without addressing our local issues, which
border on the casualisation of our academic staff,
the steep increment in tuition fees paid by students
and the non-implementation of the Universities
Miscellaneous Provisions Act, 2012, which allows
academic staff on professorial cadre to retire at 70
years against the former 65 years.”
At UI
At the University of Ibadan, Vanguard gathered that
members asked their leadership to commit the
President to signing the resolution of FG/ASUU
meeting held last week and include non-
victimisation clause.
The Chairman, ASUU, University of Ibadan, Dr.
Segun Ajiboye, said that the union had set up
project monitoring committee to ensure that funds
released by government was not misappropriated.
Ajiboye maintained that it was not how quick the
strike ends but how well it ends, adding that the goal
of the strike must be actualised.
According to him, it was regrettable that it took the
Federal Government four months to think education
was an important sector, adding that no country in
the world plays with education the way Nigerian
leaders do.
David-West
Also, former Minister of Petroleum, Professor Tam
David-West said, yesterday, that ASUU would
continue to go on strike as long as injustice
remained in the system.
He said this at the UI-ASUU congress, where he
vowed to always support all the struggles that
would lead to the rejuvenation of the education
sector.