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Wednesday 4 September 2013
ASUU: FG Releases N30bn for Lecturers' Allowances
• Appeals to union to call off strike
•NANS threatens mass protest รข€¨•
Extract workable agreement, Ikimi tells
lecturers
Omon-Julius Onabu, Damilola Oyedele
and Chineme Okafor
The federal government Tuesday
released the sum of N30 billion to the
Ministry of Education for onward
disbursement to the universities for the
payment of earned allowances of the
striking members of the Academic Staff
Union of Universities (ASUU).
Benue State Governor, Mr. Gabriel
Suswan, made this disclosure at a
meeting with the National Association
of Nigerian Students (NANS), at the
state Governor's Lodge in Abuja, where
he reiterated his appeal to the striking
union to return to the classrooms in the
interest of the future leaders of the
country.
Suswan, who is also the chairman of the
Needs Implementation Committee, said
the money for the earned allowances
was released yesterday afternoon.
The governor admitted that although
there was delay in the commencement
of the implementation of the existing
agreements, the government had
already addressed almost all of the
demands of ASUU except on the
allowances.
He described as 'unfair' comments
allegedly made by ASUU leadership that
the government was insincere and that
the government disbursement of N100
billion for infrastructure needs of the
institutions was done without
consultations.
"ASUU participated in all the meetings
where it was agreed to raise N100
billion, which has already been
distributed to all the universities. In
fact, the president of ASUU nominated
one Dr. Baffa, who is very resourceful.
He did all the work, and presented the
criteria for distribution of the money
which is based on the population of each
university," he explained.
Suswan added that after the draft
distribution was drawn up, he asked the
union to go through the document for
their satisfaction.
"Instead, they wrote me a letter
accusing the committee of insincerity.
The councils are the ones that would
verify what we are owing, go and ask
them. ASUU said no, that unless we put
N92 billion on the table," he added.
The governor clarified that the
government cannot hand over any
money blindly unless it verified the
need. This, he said, was necessary so
that every university would be allocated
the money it needed for the earned
allowances.
On the N100 billion for infrastructure,
which had already been disbursed to
the schools, Suswan said the governing
councils would be the ones to award the
contracts, and not the Needs
Implementation committee.
Suswan also alleged that the strike had
assumed a political dimension. He
appealed to all well-meaning Nigerians
to work with the federal government to
find a permanent solution to the
incessant strikes, which held the danger
of seeing to the production of mediocre
graduates.
He also urged NANS not to embark on a
protest as being canvassed in some
quarters. Instead, he appealed to the
union to urge ASUU to return to work.
"To raise N100 billion in two weeks is
not an easy task. We are making efforts
to ensure that this intervention is
sustained beyond 2013," he said.
NANS President, Mr. Yinka Gbadebo, in
an earlier address, expressed the
intention of the students' body to
embark on a protest either against the
government or ASUU.
He also urged the government to
consider the idea of interest-free loans
for tertiary education students to ease
the financial burden on those, who
cannot easily pay for their education.
But as if goading the union to maintain
its hard stance,the Forum for Justice and
Human Rights Defence (fjhd) has given
ASUU a pat on the back for its
commitment in prosecuting the three-
month old strike to compel the federal
government to finally address the
myriad of problems bedevilling the
country's university education system.
The group said the action of ASUU was
not unjustified while questioning the
sincerity of the federal government "to
meeting the said demands" despite the
reported release of N130 billion to the
governing councils of the different
universities.
In a statement by its National
Coordinator, Oghenejabor Ikimi, the
group lamented that hindsight has not
shown the government acting in a
sincere manner that would cause it to
be trusted by the ASUU leadership.
In the opinion of Ikimi, the leadership of
ASUU should not shift ground on the
strike issue until the government
demonstrated its seriousness by signing
a kind of undertaking to implement the
reformatory recommendations of the
academic union after the strike would
have been called off.
The statement said: "Even if the federal
government's intention in the above
regard is sincere, it is our considered
opinion that before ASUU calls off its
strike action, it must ensure that the
federal government as a matter of
urgency, signs a workable document
with the leadership of ASUU on how it
intends to meet their demands bearing
in mind that a similar agreement signed
in 2009 between the federal
government and ASUU has not been
implemented by the Federal
Government till date.
"The group believes that ASUU's
demands are genuine and real as (the
strike) is an attempt by ASUU to save
our educational system from extinction.
For instance, in a recent world
assessment of universities where the
list of the world's first 1,000 universities
were published no Nigerian university
was mentioned.
The group stressed that “our
universities deserve better funding to
be able to re-position and revitalise
itself as citadels of learning before they
can turn out graduates the nation can
be proud of."
However, the Delta State University,
Abraka (DELSU) chapter of ASUU has
expressed appreciation to Nigerians "for
the support availed ASUU so far in the
struggle", saying it would not waver but
remain resolute until victory was
achieved.
In a statement signed by its chairman,
Dr. Emmanuel Nwafor Mordi, the body
also condemned what it called shoddy
conduct recently of the university's
Post-UTME, claiming that its
organisation "fell short of minimum
standards for DELSU examinations."
Meanwhile, the National Association of
Philosophy Students (NAPS) has said the
federal government’s inability to
implement the 2009 agreement was a
clear indication of its untrustworthy
nature.
NAPS stated at a press briefing in Abuja
yesterday, that the issues raised by
ASUU, which had resulted in an
indefinite nationwide strike were
basically for the good of all Nigerian
public institutions and as such should
not be hard for the government to
implement..
Its Chairman, Adeshina Lukman, said in
his address, that the union and all other
student bodies in the country were
disturbed with the development and
had giving the government an
ultimatum to address the situation as
soon as possible, failure of which, it
would galvanise a mass protest against
the government.
“It is no longer news that Nigerian
universities are underfunded, Nigerian
universities cannot be compared with
any university in the world and this
explains why there is brain-drain in the
country,” the association lamented.
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