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From John Adams, Minna
The joint nationwide of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) and the Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC) led to business and government activities being brought to a stand still on Tuesday in Minna, the Niger State capital, as ASUU and members of organised labour marched along the major road of the city.
The protesters, comprising ASUU members from the Federal University of Technology (FUT), Minna and the state-owned Ibrahim Badamosi Babangida University (IBBU), Lapai and members of the organized labour defied the cloudy weather in Minna and assembled at the labour house, IBB road in Minna as early as 7:00 am.
The protest march took off at 9:00 am and brought vehicular movements to a standstill, with the demonstrators walking the major road in the state capital, and terminating at the state House of Assembly, where they were received by the Speaker, Hon Bawa Wuse.
The placard-carrying protesters received solidarity cheers from the public as they walked the road under heavy security to avoid the protest being hijacked by hoodlums.
Addressing the protesters, Niger NLC Vice Chairman Bako Abdulrahman, who stood in for the chairman, lamented that the ASUU strike has led to students engaging in social vices due to idleness while ASUU members are faced with hardship due to the halting of their salaries.
He urged ASUU members to get their PVCs ready as that is the only way they effect any change in the forthcoming general elections.
Related: ASUU Strike: Nasarawa NLC joints nationwide protest
He stressed the need for members to also rally their households to come out and vote during the elections, adding: “The PVC is an agent of change. During elections, the civil servants and ASUU are those who are used as returning officers. We have the weapon to deal with them, we have the weapon to bring in those we want to rule us. We cannot allow miscreants to continue to preside over our destiny.”
Speaking on behalf of the students, the Niger state President of the National Association of Niger state Students (NANISS), Saliha Buhari, also resonated with the Vice Chairman’s point that the PVC is a weapon to effect change.
According to him, the students are coming up with a policy of ‘no resumption, no election’ stressing that they will not allow any election to hold if they do not go back to school.
Buhari stated that students may be forced to go for the opposition parties because the APC government has shown them that education is not on their priority list.
“To every student, please get your PVC, your PVC is your weapon to get the change desired. If ASUU demands are not met and we are not called back to our various campuses, we will implement the ‘no resumption, no election’ move.
“If we do not go back to our schools, we are going to call on all Nigerian students to vote for the opposition party because the APC government have shown us that they will not give our education priority, they do not care about us or want us to go to school. We are tired. Enough is enough,” she said.
The FUT Minna ASUU Chairman, Gbolahan Bolarin, appreciated the NLC for showing their solidarity with the plights of the lecturers saying that he hopes the government would take steps towards meeting their demands without delay.
