ASUU STRIKE: ERC welcomes NUT,
NUPENG and NUEE’s decision to call
solidarity strike on october 17, 2013 at 1:28 am in education BY LAJU ARENYEKA The Education Rights Campaign (ERC) has said that
it welcomes the decision of three trade unions – the
Nigerian Union of Teachers (NUT), the National
Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers
(NUPENG) and the National Union of Electricity
Employees (NUEE) – to embark on solidarity strike actions to compel the Federal Government to
honour agreements signed with the Academic Staff
Union of Universities (ASUU). The National Coordinator of the ERC, Mr. Hassan
Soweto said this in a statement to newsmen
recently. Soweto urged the three unions to take this
beyond the realm of threats and immediately name
a day on which the solidarity strike would take
place. He said that the unions should begin “active mobilisation of their rank and file members as well
as students who are frustrated at home and
concerned Nigerians to come out en-masse for
mass protests and demonstrations on this day.” Adding, the ERC Boss said: “We commend the three
unions for taking this decision which we believe is
in the best interest of the education sector and the
Nation at large. We agree that the ASUU strike has
gone on for far too long and the plethora of strikes
in the education sector are just too many. Slowly the entire public education sector is grinding to a
halt. For instance, the public polytechnics are
equally closed and it will not be too long before the
Colleges of Education Academic Staff Union
(COEASU) follow suit. The Colleges of Education
lecturers had recently held a 7-day warning strike. Indeed, the Academic Staff of Union of Polytechnics
(ASUP) had to resume the strike, they had
suspended in July after three months, due to the
insensitivity and insincerity of government to their
demands and terms of the suspension of the last
strike.” Soweto argued that such a solidarity strike would
be in the best interest of the education sector and
the country at large. He said: “The three unions
come from key sectors of the Nation’s economy. As
such their decision to embark on solidarity strike if
given full and practical effect could help pile pressure on the recalcitrant anti-poor Federal
Government to meet demands of striking education
unions so that public Universities and Polytechnics
can be reopened for academic activities to resume.
This would also serve as an example for other
unions and the entire labour movement to follow. We want to stress that the solidarity actions which
the NUT, NUPENG and NUEE have envisioned should
also cover and back the strikes of ASUP, COEASU
and all other unions in the education sector that
have any on-going dispute with the government
over pay, conditions and education funding. This is the best way to ensure that all the outstanding
disputes in the education sector are resolved and
all public Universities, Polytechnics and Colleges of
Educations are opened for full and undisrupted
academic activities.” Soweto added that the ERC
understands the position of Nigerians who believe that the entire sector will crumble if such a union as
the NUT goes on strike. In response to this, he said:
The point that must be made is that with or without
strikes, the entire education sector including
secondary and primary education has already been
destroyed and shutdown in terms of standard and quality that it is simply a pipe dream to imagine any
serious learning is going on at any point in time in
any of our public schools.” We are yet to distribute the N100 billion —VCs After Seven full weeks of the widely reported
announcement of the distribution of N100 billion
to 59 public universities, as part of Federal
Government’s commitment to fund the
implementation of identified needs of the nation’s
public universities, there are indications that red- tapism or perhaps, insincerity of purpose has
hindered the funds from getting to universities. Grapevines from universities authorities,
comprising of Vice Chancellors reveal that the
monies have been gotten through the usual official
policy statements and memo, but not in cash or
cheque. For the avoidance of doubt, this said money was
‘gallantly’ shopped by the Governor Gabriel
Suswam-led Presidential Implementation
Committee on Needs Assessment of Nigerian
Universities within 16 days of its inauguration (July
26- August 1, 2013). If this whooping N100 billion was shopped from
acclaimed sources like the Central Bank of Nigeria
(CBN), Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation
(NNPC), Nigerian Communications Commission
(NCC) and other government agencies, within 16
days of round-the-clock work; if the sharing formular which will be presented below was
arrived at within 16 days of heated debates and
counter debates, should there be any, then the
expedient question is why the delay in
implementation, that is disbursement to the nation’s
decrepit universities after the ‘nice’ sharing formular, which has been made available to
Vanguard Learning. In the words of one of the revered sources
contacted, Prof. Ukachukwu Awuzie, Ag. VC, Imo
State University (IMSU), Owerri, who was the
immediate-past National President of the Academic
Staff Union of Universities (ASUU): “FG has only sent
us a memo through the Ministry of Education that IMSU is getting N650 million from the funds. Until
we get the alert into the university’s account, we
will know how sincere, government is…”
Similarly, Prof. John Obafunwa, Vice Chancellor,
Lagos State University (LASU), Ojo disclosed that the
N1.200 billion earmarked for the university has not been paid as cheque or cash into the university’s
account. After about one month, what is preventing
universities official accounts from getting the e-
credit alerts.
According to the allocation, which grapevines say
was based on “students’ population and the depth
of infrastructural decadence glaring individual universities in the face,” of the 40 National
Universities Commission (NUC) officially recognized
Federal Universities, 27 will get varying amounts
from the fund, leaving out 13. For State universities,
of the 39 officially recognized, 34 will get varying
amounts, leaving out 5.

We welcome you all!!!
I just hope that by the time this Government still don't answer us, you people we be ready to stay for months with us ooh. Because what you people still don't know is how much this current administration don't care if anything is going sideways in this country right now.
All they are doing is saving for the rainy day, should they not make it past the next election!
You all are welcome to Nigeria; the Goliath of Africa, that has allowed the Joseph of corruption to slay him!!!