Education

FG To Hold Meeting With ASUU To Avert Another Strike

Published

3 years ago

Jul 29, 2021.

The spokesman for the Ministry of Education, Gong, has hatred for this union; he just pushes out lies without consulting.”

EKO HOT BLOG reports that the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) will on Friday, July 30, 2021, meet with the Federal Government (FG) to avert another fresh strike in federal universities across the country.

The latest development was made known by the ASUU National President, Prof Emmanuel Osodeke, on Wednesday.

The ASUU President disclosed that the union was invited by the Ministry of Labour to discuss issues surrounding the Memorandum of Action, which was signed with the FG in December 2020.

It would be recalled that the spokesman for the Ministry of Education, Ben Gong, had challenged ASUU to be more specific in its allegations that the government had violated agreements it reached with the union.

Gong had said that the University Transparency and Accountability Solution, which was developed by ASUU, could not deduct tax.

However, while speaking on Wednesday, the ASUU President stressed that the last time the union met with the Federal Government was around March/April, noting that it was the Minister of Labour, Dr Chris Ngige, who invited the members of the union to Friday’s meeting.

Osodeke said, “The Ministry of Education, which is our ministry, has not called us to any meeting since we signed the Memorandum of Action. But the Ministry of Labour, which is just an intervention ministry, around March/April called us to a meeting in which we discussed and they promised to implement all those things.

“Three weeks ago, we met with the Minister of Labour, who said we should give him two weeks and he has finally invited us to a meeting on Friday. The spokesman for the Ministry of Education, Gong, has hatred for this union; he just pushes out lies without consulting. Ask him when you see him, has the ministry ever invited us since the MoA was signed to say they have done this and couldn’t do that?”

The ASUU President added that the union never said it would go on strike, but was calling on the Federal Government to do the needful.

“I have not mentioned strike; what we have said is that we have issues, which the Federal Government has not resolved and I hope that they will resolve them before the next ASUU NEC meeting in August, where we will decide on what to do.

TUC

“I have not used the word strike. It is when NEC meets that we will decide on what to do, but it seems that the press and Nigerians always interpret it as a strike,” Osodeke stated.

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