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Director General of the Progressives Governors Forum, Salihu Lukman, has urged lecturers in public universities to show moderation and patriotism in their demands from the federal government.
The umbrella body of academics in public universities, the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), suspended a nine-month-old strike last week.
Amongst other commitments, the federal government has promised the release of N40 billion earned academic allowances and another N30 billion revitalisation fund.
Unresolved issues include the demand for the replacement of the Integrated Payroll and Personal Information System (IPPIS) with University Transparency and Accountability Solution (UTAS) and implementation of the FG-ASUU agreement of 2009 bordering on university autonomy and funding.
The Director-General of the Progressives Governors Forum, Dr. Salihu Lukman, has described the seemingly unending power tussle between the Federal Government and the Academic Staff Union of Universities, as the greatest disservice to Nigeria’s public education system.
Lukman noted that there was enough blame to go around on both sides if the blame game was to be relied upon.
He, however, said, amidst the accusations, counter-accusations and the destructively long strikes, the nation’s public education system and our teeming youths have been the worst for it.
This was contained in a statement titled, “ASUU and Indeterminate Power Struggle – The Boko Haram Logic,” which he signed and made public in Abuja, on Sunday.
Humanity has never had it so gruel with Mother Nature as it did in the outgoing year 2020. Indeed, the world writhed in pains as humans, in many climes, when they were not waging a war against one of nature’s vagaries, including the novel Coronavirus pandemic, were contending with diverse sheds of catastrophe, or being battered by natural and unnatural disasters.
Apart from the pandemic, which shattered plans and projections by individuals and governments, the country accelerated its descent into a failed state, while leaders were at their wits’ end, and the government’s spokespersons became more propagandist in nature, and even telling barefaced lies.
ASUU National President, Biodun Ogunyemi, made the announcement during a press briefing in Abuja. x
Ogunyemi also warned that the union would return to strike without notice if the government fails in meeting its part of the agreement reached with the university lecturers.
The Union chairman, however, stated that the reopening of the schools, considering the COVID-19 pandemic, lies with the Federal Government and Senate.
The government and ASUU have been at loggerheads over the reopening of public universities in the country.
Both parties have held series of meetings but failed to reach a conclusion for ASUU to call off the strike since February 2020.