Senate Wades Into ASUU Strike, Calls Demands ‘Absolutely Unnecessary’

An end may be in sight for the four-month old
strike embarked upon by the Academic Staff
Union of Universities (ASUU) as the Senate,
Wednesday, mandated its President, Senator
David Mark, to engage both the federal
government and ASUU with a view to ending the strike. The senators, who urged the striking lecturers
to return to the classroom to prevent what
they described as further devaluation of the
country’s educational fortunes, also mandated
the committee on education to liase with the
Federal Ministry of Education, National Universities Commission (NUC) and all other
relevant stakeholders to proffer a lasting
solution to the crisis. The Senate’s resolution, which followed a
motion sponsored by 107 senators and
presented by Senate Leader, Victor Ndoma-
Egba, recalled that ASUU had been on strike
since July 1 in protest of federal government’s
alleged failure to implement the 2009 agreement signed with lecturers for proper
funding of the nation’s universities. According to him, the Senate noted with
concern that the strike had paralysed
academic activities in the universities and
consequently rendered the institutions
redundant, stressing that several negotiations
between the striking lecturers and the federal government along with the intervention of
some prominent Nigerians have failed to
produce the desired results. Ndoma-Egba also revealed that despite the
release of N100 billion for infrastructural
development to the universities as well as
additional N30 billion as accumulated
allowances by the federal government, the
lecturers have refused to be pacified, regretting that a situation where ASUU is on
strike, Academic Staff Union of Polytechnics
(ASUP) is also on strike and the College of
Education Academic Staff Union (COEASU) also
recently embarking on seven days of warning
strike is worrisome. Presenting the details of ASUU’s demands as
contained in the 2009 agreement with the
federal government by the Chairman, Senate
Committee on Education, Senator Uche
Chukwumerije shocked his colleagues, with
some of the demands of the union perceived as unnecessary. Such demands include maternity leave
allowance, sick leave allowance, injury
allowance, car allowance, postgraduate (PG)
grants for the supervision of PG students,
external excess workload allowance,
sabbatical leave allowance, teaching practice and industrial training allowance as well as
funding of the state and federal universities. The total sum of the demands by ASUU in
figure, according to Chukwumerije, amounted
to N1,05 trillion, adding that it was agreed
that N5 billion would be released in 2009,
another N5 billion in 2010, among others. Speaking on the strike, Mark implored ASUU to
return to the classroom on behalf of the
Senate, saying he thought details of the
agreement when being read by Chukwumerije
were mere proposals in view of the degree of
triviality involved. According to him, the nature of the agreement
showed that those who represented the
federal government at the negotiation table
where it was signed, were people who did not
know their right from their left. He described
the action as unfair to the nation.