by Tope Adesipo Abio

Great Nigerian students, when the strike first began we
thought that this ASUU members have started again, for
once we were all tired of the incessant strike over
wages and allowances the question that kept coming
to our mind is what do they want again? after-
all,school fees has been kept reasonably constant in
federal university for some years now.
Our mind was definitely filled with different sentiments
but after taking a closer look at the agreement the
federal government signed with ASUU in 2009, the nitty
gritty of it,which we believe that an agreement is
supposed to be an honourable contract between two
parties Contrary to this, the President Jonathan’s
government has been unfair to the letters and spirit of
the 2009 FGN/ASUU agreement.
For instance, while the agreement stipulates annual
increases in budgetary allocation to education between
2009 and 2020 until it reaches 26%, the Federal
government budgeted just a paltry 8.5% to education
this year.
All ASUU is demanding now is that the agreement must
be fully implemented. To all students, we cannot be
indifferent to the content of this agreement just because
of our fears about the academic calendar! and our not
too friendly lecturers.
If this agreement is fully implemented, together with
democratic management of schools to include elected
representatives of education workers and students, it
would mean better funding of education and a great
relief to overburdened students. It is therefore, in our
best interest as students to ensure this agreement is
fully implemented by supporting the implementation and
fighting to save public education from collapse.
Of course, if we look at the condition of facilities for
teaching and research in most state universities and
federal universities,you can not but sincerely agree that
there is an urgent need for us to act now to save
Nigeria’s education sector from a total collapse! it is
reported that the Nigerian government has amassed
huge fortune since the democratic experiment began in
1999. It will interest us to know that between 2000 and
2011, Nigeria government earned N48.48 trillion from
the sale of oil alone against N3.10 trillion earned
between 1979 and 1999 (Guardian, 24/3/13).
With this tremendous upswing in the revenue at the
disposal of the Nigeria government, one would have
expected it to translate to a commensurate
improvement in the quantity and quality of Nigeria’s
public education not only that, the government is quick
to tell us the country is broke but it didnt take sanusi
lamido sanusi time to inject 600billion naira into failed
banks of politicians and their cronies. 200million dollars
was used to bail out nollywood..
Unfortunately, given the present state of public
education it is very clear that it’s more than ever
enmeshed in a monumental crisis largely characterized
by poor funding. As a matter of fact the budgetary
allocation to education has fallen from 12.22% in 1985
to 8.5% in 2013. Comparing this year allocation of 8.5%
with UNESCO recommendation of 26% budgetary
allocation to education it is very clear that Nigeria
government is not really interested in funding
education.
Here in Nigeria, more than half of the nation’s budget
goes to salaries and allowance of political office
holders. This is an embarassing paradox in a situation
where many countries with smaller GDP have their
percentage budgetary allocations to education as
follows: Ghana (31%) ; Cote d’ivoire (20%); Kenya
(23%); Morocco (17.7%); Botswana (19.0%); Swaziland
(24.6%); Lesotho (17.0%); Burkina Faso (16.8%);
Uganda (27.0%) and Tunisia (17.0%).
in the Nigerian universities, laboratories are
overcrowded, stove are still been use in the 21st
century, water do not run in the lab and often times
lectures are suspended due to lack of electricity.
It has also been reported that in 2013, 1.7 million
candidates sat for the Unified Tertiary Matriculation
Examination (UTME) and from the available space in all
the universities, polytechnics and colleges of education
in the country only less than 29 percent of the total
candidates will be admitted, thus leaving out over 1.2
million candidates.
No Nigerian university is ranked among the best 5,000
in the world or among first twenty in Africa. foreign
professional use to be at the university of Ibadan,
today, they have deserted and our own lecturers are
also running for greener pastures . There are just about
34,504 lecturers left in the Universities out of about
50000 needed for optimum efficiency.
A visit to the Olabisi Onabanjo University, Ago Iwoye
sums up the Nigerian scenario the university has been
turned to a mere glorified secondary school. The
facilities are dilapidated and lecture rooms looks like a
pig cage the same scenario is what we have in
University of Uyo, University of Calabar and other
universities are also in crisis with decaying
infrastructures. At the Osun State University, about
three sets of medical students are in limbo between
pre-clinical and clinical stages because of the lack of a
teaching hospital.
I strongly believe that the fight to save the education
sector from collapse and underfunding is a fight we
must champion and pursue as students who are the
major stakeholders in the universities, polytechnics and
monothenics
We must also know that this fight cut across board and
all political parties in Nigeria are united in their anti poor
policies. You will recall that the ACN that calls itself the
progressive Only last year callously increased the fees
of the Lagos State University (LASU) from N25, 000 to
between N280, 000 and N345, 750. A development
that has led to sharp drop in the number of students
picking up admission because they cannot afford it. Of
the 5,000 quota given to LASU by the NUC only about
1,200 students had applied as at today.
This has contributed to the planned rationalization of
program and departments in LASU. This means that
departments will be scrapped or merged.
Greatest Nigerian students, it is in light of this, that I
call on students to boldly and continue to make this
sacrifices by backing the genuine demands of ASUU so
that our generation can get it right once and for all.
—————————-
Op-ed pieces and contributions are the opinions of the
writers only and do not represent the opinions of Y!/
YNaija.

http://www.ynaija.com/opinion-why-ASUU-must-not-call-off-its-strike/?utm_source=Y!&utm_medium=twitter

na God go help us

Our president was once a lecturer, still he has no positive agenda for Education...even if the strike is called off now, He's still a slugish leader.

We should not be quick at blaming Jonathan simply because one lai mohammed rubbished his administration. If we look at it deeply, increasing budgetary allocation to 26 percent should also b done by state governments whereas, state governors turned a blind eyes to this. This is why lasu is paying 250k and other unis also. If governors had also injected funds to education in their various states, it is possible dat school fee in states uni will not b dat high. May GOD help us sha

[color=#990000][/color] yur a fool mann, wah do u mean ASUU suldnt call off? Cos yur not in the system or what? If yur not in the system, then u ll always experience delays in ur life. Just one semester to go and yur blabbing trash.
Delays shall always be yours mann since that's what you wish your fellow brothers.

he is right. It is better for everyone to fight for this thing now and see educational transformation or retreat and continue graduating mediocres .