The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) has said that to end the over five months strike by the union, implementation of a renegotiated 2009 Agreement must be signed.
The union stated this on Sunday, maintaining that its members have sacrificed so much with non-payment of allowance for over nine years.
The Chairman ASUU, University of Ibadan, Professor Ayo Akinwole, who stated this in Ibadan, called on Nigerians not to see the strike as an ASUU thing but as a fight all citizens of the country must own to have a future of quality education for their children.
According to Professor Akinwole, the President Muhammadu Buhari-led government has displayed the capacity to abuse trust, saying that the Memorandum of Understanding and Memorandum of Action signed with the government were not honoured.
“Until we rise above sentiments to get responsible and responsive people who will be accountable to Nigerians into public offices the cycles of strikes will not end in Nigeria,” he said, adding that although the Federal Government has stopped the salaries of their members for five months, the lecturers are resolved to fight to victory over the parasitic ruling class.
He urged Nigerians to all join the struggle to get money from the government to revitalise public-funded universities in order to give children of the Nigerian masses hope of governing their country.
He said ASUU would actively participate in the two-day protest organised by NLC and other Labour unions.
He said, “It is sad that President Buhari’s government which prides itself as fighting corruption will be frustrating the use of the homegrown solution for IPPIS that has been discredited by audit report of 2019.
“We got here by collective negligence of electing incompetent people into public offices. The fight for quality education for the children of the masses has become a class war among the economic elite, the working class and the ruling class. until we rise up and demand accountability from those in office to do what is in the best interest of the majority, the cycle of strikes and underdevelopment will not stop.
“Nigerians continue to elect people who don’t care about them. We worship those who have money than those with the right virtues and have the interest of society at heart.
“Our renegotiation ought to have ended by 2012 but here we are in 2022 and yet the government is playing games with us.
“We are asking for a renegotiation of existing agreements that will position our members as human beings working in a decent place. We are asking for the Revitalization of Public Universities through appropriate funding.
“We are saying we have a better homegrown alternative of University Transparency Accountability Solution (UTAS), we are saying check the proliferation of Universities that you cannot fund and we are saying Nigerians deserve to be ranked among the top 100 in the world if our leaders invest in education.
“We should be developing our own solutions not depending on others. Sadly we have an uncoordinated Presidency and cabinet working at Cross purposes. This strike is not about ASUU, It is about the future of the Nigerian children.”
