Honour pact with ASUU, NBA tell FG
Friday, July 3, 2009
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The Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) has called on the Federal Government to respect the agreement it reached with the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), in order to arrest the deteriorating state of the educational system. In a release signed by the NBA President, Oluwarotimi Akeredolu (SAN), the association warned that the much vaunted agenda of the government would remain a forlorn dream without quality input from the universities.

The association also expressed concern on the levity with which the present government was handling the delicate security situation in the Niger Delta.
It urged the government to separate genuine agitators from felons, who have tainted the struggle for the emancipation of the people of the region with their acts of criminality.
While calling on the government to accept its failure and apologise for the inexplicable neglect of the region, the lawyers noted that the genuinely aggrieved must be sifted from commercial agitators who come in different forms.

The lawyers also urged the government to determine the appropriateness of the amnesty offered to the militants.
“While we do not wish to contend with the government on the appropriateness of purporting to grant amnesty to a people serially violated by the rapacity of the ruling class, the omnibus extension of a qualified programme of reprieve to even criminals appears thoughtless,” they insist.
The association further blamed successive governments for the rot in the education sector, adding that the present administration of President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua lacks any clue to the perennial problems afflicting the country.

“The current administration does not appear to possess any clue as regards the realistic solution to the perennial challenges faced by the country.” To save the education sector from total collapse, the NBA enjoined stakeholders in the polity to intervene and rescue the system.
“Education, at both the primary, secondary and tertiary levels is in a sorry state.
“Nigerian elite feel complacent at the destruction of these tiers of learning because of false consciousness of superiority. All good people in the country have the duty to impress it on our politicians that the issue of education must be taken seriously.”