ASUU has been on strike since June 30.
The Vice President Namadi Sambo has, in a bid to end the
continuous gridlock in the dialogue between the Academic
Staff Union of Universities, ASUU and federal government,
taken over the negotiation process. The government’s
negotiation team was formerly headed by the Secretary to
the Government of the Federation, Pius Anyim.
For the first time since the commencement of the over 10-
week-old strike action by the union, the Vice President met
with the leadership of the union at the Presidential Villa on
Thursday.
The meeting was held behind closed doors.
Nigerian Universities have been shut down since June 30 as a
result of federal government’s failure to honour an
agreement signed between it and ASUU in 2009 bothering on
issues of university funding and improvement of
infrastructure in the sector.
Speaking to journalists at the Presidential Villa after the
closed door meeting, the ASUU President, Nasir Fagge, said
that he was taking back a “message given to him at the
meeting for his members” and that Nigerians would have to
wait for the response of his members on the way forward.
“We have had a meeting with the Vice President and he has
given us a message to our members, and we said that as the
messengers that we are, we are going to deliver the
message faithfully to our members and then they will take
the decision.”
According to him, “I know Nigerians are expecting a solution to
the strike, we also want a solution, but I have been given a
message to our members. The message is not for Nigerians,
it is for our members”.
“If I deliver the message, our principal will decide and we will
get back to the ministry of education within this week,” he
added, saying the union would get back to the education
minister on its stance on the government’s latest offer.
The federal government had offered N100 billion and N30 billion
for infrastructure development in various universities and
payment of verified earned allowances of lecturers
respectively. It is not clear if the government made an
improved offer for the lecturers whose only demand is that
government implements fully the 2009 agreement.
The Minister of State for Education, Nyesom Wike, who was
also at the meeting, explained that the meeting had been
convened to find a lasting solution to the crisis.
“One is quit hopeful that ASUU is committed, they have the
passion and that there is the need for us to move the
education sector forward.
“ASUU coming to discuss means that they are committed on
their own part and that the federal government is also
committed. We have gone very far, we believe that in no
distance time, you will have a very good result,” he said.
Also on the ASUU delegation were two former Presidents of
ASUU, Dipo Fasina and Abdullahi Sule-Kano.
Other members of the government’s delegation included the
Executive Secretary of the National Universities Commission
(NUC), Julius Okojie; as well as the Vice Chancellors of Bayero
University Kano (BUK), University of Ibadan (UI) and Abubakar
Tafawa Balewa University (ATBU) Bauchi, Abdulrasheed
Abubakar, Isaac Adewole, and Muhammed Muhammed
respectively.