Follow Us on Google
From Felix Ikem, Nsukka
The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), University of Nigeria, Nsukka (UNN) branch, says their members are ready and fully mobilized to commenced industrial action as soon as they get a directive from the national headquarters of the union.
Comrade Christian Opata the chairman of UNN-ASUU disclose this in a statement issued on Thursday in Nsukka, where he urged parents, students and the general public to prevail on the federal government to do the needful by fulfilling the memorandum of action it entered with the union on 23 December 2020 to avert the impending strike.
According to the statement which was jointly signed by Opata and his secretary Comrade Michael Nwokedi, the union pleaded with FG not to push them to the trenches.
“We the members of ASUU UNN branch after an unprecedented and well-attended congress wish to bring to the attention of Nigerians and the general public how insensitive of FG is a deliberate strategy to kill the future of Nigerians student.
“Our children have suffered enough, so government should stop toying with the academic future of Nigerian children.
“We plead with Nigerians to plead with FG not to push us into going back to strike again by fulfilling all pending agreements it entered with the union, else we are ready and fully mobilized for a strike should the government decide not to put its ears to the ground to hear the ballad of the ants,” he said.
The ASUU boss expressed disappointment that so many memoranda of understanding and memorandum of action entered with the union since 2009 has not been fully implemented.
“FG appears to be more at home in killing indigenous knowledge and discouraging local content in its pursuit of development, if not, why have they failed to adopt the University Transparency And Accountability Solution which the Union developed as and viable alternative to Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS).
“It is unfortunate that our universities are have turned to glorified secondary school because of government negligence, as FG is in a hurry to establish universities and ready to equip and maintenance to international standard,” he said.
The union alleged that there is an underground plan by successive governments to make tertiary education inaccessible to the poor.
“The FG want to throw on a system where the poor will never have access to tertiary education given the way and manner they shy away from their responsibilities.
“State governments are not left out as some of them owes state universities up to four months arrears of salary,” he said.
The union expressed concern why it must take protest to sign an agreement, another protest, intervention by concern and eminent Nigerians before government show some sense of responsibility by honouring the agreement in part.
