February 14, (THEWILL) – The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) has declared a nationwide strike, effective Monday, February 14, 2022.
Addressing a press conference on Monday at the end of a two-day deliberation of the union’s national executive council (NEC), President of ASUU, Prof. Emmanuel Osodeke, said the strike, would last for an initial period of four weeks.
Osodeke said the industrial action is “comprehensive and total.”
Members of the NEC, encompassing ASUU leaders across campuses had held meetings since Saturday at the University of Lagos.
ASUU had decided to embark on the two-day meeting after it sensitised and mobilized lecturers and students across all varsities on the reason the union might go on a strike.
The lecturers had threatened to embark on another round of industrial action following the alleged “government’s unfaithfulness” in the implementation of the Memorandum of Action it signed with the union, leading to the suspension of the 2020 strike action.
After the union’s National Executive Council meeting at the University of Abuja on November 13 and 14, ASUU President, Prof. Osodeke, lamented that despite meeting with the Minister of Labour and Employment, Dr. Chris Ngige, on October 14, 2021, on issues, including funding for revitalisation of public universities, earned academic allowances, University Transparency Accountability Solution; promotion arrears, renegotiation of 2009 ASUU-FGN Agreement, and the inconsistencies in Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System Payment, none of its demands had been met.
But President Muhammadu Buhari had recently assured that his administration would honour its agreements with the union to prevent incessant strikes in the education sector.
“My administration is committed to this engagement and dialogue, and I urge them to stay the course towards a joint resolution in the best interest of our children and nation,” he had said.
