THOSE AGAINST FREE EDUCATION IN IMSU BEHIND STRIKE It has become increasingly necessary at this point to let the good people of the state and indeed, the general public know that inspite of the repeated appeals by the Governor, Owelle Rochas Okorocha to the staff of Imo State University especially members of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) IMSU branch to call of the strike they had embarked upon without any acceptable reason, those against the Free Education Programme within the Institution have ensured that such patriotic appeals were not given the expected Consideration. The government wants to place on record that the staff of IMSU are on strike over one month salary owed to them. And that is the month of April. They have received their full salaries upto the month of March, 2016. Let them come out to say it is not true. It is also advisable to inform Imo people and all those concerned that, in their bid to continue to hold the government to ransome, the ASUU Chapter of IMSU which had for decades been part of the Nigeria Labour Congress, (NLC) has now come out to say that they are no longer part of NLC. Against the backdrop of their claim of not having any relationship again with NLC, ASUU insisted on full payment of their salaries instead of the Percentage other workers in the state including governor’s appointees had received, following the agreement between government and the organized Labour in the State. All the same, owing to the high premium the government places on education, IMSU Staff were paid One Hundred percent of their salaries upto March, with the hope that they would call off the strike, but they never did. The government has also discovered that those behind this strike using ASUU as tool are those who never liked or believed in the Free Education Programme of the state government. They are not happy that students do not pay school fees and other related charges again. Otherwise, it becomes difficult to understand why the Institution should be on strike over April salary since the month of May has not ended. And even when some other state Universities across the nation are being owed salary arrears, ranging from four to six months. The strike in IMSU cannot be explained. It is a well scripted blackmail and a carefully articulated sabotage against the Free Education programme of the government. It is equally on record that before the coming of Owelle Rochas Okorocha as governor, IMSU was getting N57million as monthly subvention. And Governor Okorocha came and increased it to N297million because of the Free Education Programme. And the government has been religious in paying this subvention. The most intriguing aspect of the IMSU matter is that since the inception of this administration, the Institution has not given account of any Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) even when they generate revenue from other sources including postgraduate programmes. It should also be noted that those behind this unwarranted and ill-advised strike action in IMSU do not also monitor developments across the nation. If they had done that, they would have been celebrating the administration in the state that it could pay them upto the month of March. All these notwithstanding, the governor once again appeals to ASUU members of the Imo State University to call off the strike in the overall interest of the students of the Institution in particular and the society at large. Sam Onwuemeodo (Chief Press Secretary to the Governor)