Fellow Nairalanders, lets reflect on this:It beats my imagination that a country who is preparing to be a member of the G-20 by the year 20-20 can afford to be comfortable seeing her future leaders seat at home for over a month and nothing positive is being done to quench this shame. Even Nairaland is quiet over this issue. Why?

From what I have figured out of this present face-off, I feel the federal government have been sincere enough but the lecturers are too dumb to understand the government's position. I am no a fan of yaradua, but listening to him yesterday, I concored with his government's stands on this issue.

ASUU can not force the government of Nigeria to sign an agreement that will be binding on all institutions (including state owned ones). The rule of law does not permit that. Government has offered what it can afford and the lecturers have agreed then tell me why are they bent on signing any stupid agreement? What if the government sign an agreement and decides not to obey its provisions, what will ASUU do? I think our university system is in the hands of some irresponsible, selfish and dumb individuals who think of nothing but their own wreched self. If they are tired of teaching then they should get out of the system lets look for competent hands for our children. And for NASU, government has made it clear that it has no intensions to intruduce tuition fees in our higher institutions, then why are the selfish old men not calling off the strike. I will give my total sopport to our students if they decide to stage a social unrest on this issue, let then baricade our roads, close offices and cause confussion, then I think the messege will be recieved in the right quarters. What do you guys think?

I dont blame the lecturers. what I blame is the system? Even calling on the federal government to sign such an agreement is a clear indication that they are not truely lecturing, otherwise they should know the implication of that  better than any other person. Even a goat knows what federalism is all about.

kokoA:

Fellow Nairalanders, lets reflect on this:It beats my imagination that a country who is preparing to be a member of the G-20 by the year 20-20 can afford to be comfortable seeing her future leaders seat at home for over a month and nothing positive is being done to quench this shame. Even Nairaland is quiet over this issue. Why?

From what I have figured out of this present face-off, I feel the federal government have been sincere enough but the lecturers are too dumb to understand the government's position. I am no a fan of yaradua, but listening to him yesterday, I concored with his government's stands on this issue.

ASUU can not force the government of Nigeria to sign an agreement that will be binding on all institutions (including state owned ones). The rule of law does not permit that. Government has offered what it can afford and the lecturers have agreed then tell me why are they bent on signing any stupid agreement? What if the government sign an agreement and decides not to obey its provisions, what will ASUU do? I think our university system is in the hands of some irresponsible, selfish and dumb individuals who think of nothing but their own wreched self. If they are tired of teaching then they should get out of the system lets look for competent hands for our children. And for NASU, government has made it clear that it has no intensions to intruduce tuition fees in our higher institutions, then why are the selfish old men not calling off the strike. I will give my total sopport to our students if they decide to stage a social unrest on this issue, let then baricade our roads, close offices and cause confussion, then I think the messege will be recieved in the right quarters. What do you guys think?

You are right on the issue that the government cannot sign an agreement on behalf of a state university. What each university should do is have a contract with each lecturer (not as a Union) . Let the contract state how much the lecturer will be paid, how salary will increase based on performance and feed backs from the student and, the amount of hours each week they spend teaching or be around campus. This is how a lot of developed countries are doing it, which is one of the reasons why you do not hear of too many strikes. It not as if the lecturers in the U.S or U.K are satisfied with their pay but since they know how many hours they have to spend a week teaching, some of them are able to have other jobs without having a conflict with the school.

In my opinion, the students are the most hard hit in these strikes which have become something of a tradition. But sadly, they do not seem to be ready to take any form of action to help themselves. They are the ones being forced to bribe lecturers in order to be given grades that they deserve, they are the ones getting some useless handouts shoved than their throats, they get sexually harrassed, most of them go through their semesters recieving only a small fraction of the amount of tutoring they should be getting, and they carry out their learning in a dilapedated, far less than standard learning environment, and to crown it all, they are the ones who end up spending more years than they should in the university over an issue that can be resolved in more productive ways.
They should get themselves together and organize a protest, a violent protest, to demand for both an end to the strike and better learning conditions, because it appears that force is the only language those theiving and self-centred politicians understand.