‘The worst mistake the Federal Government will further make is not to take serious action to put an end to the attacks and kidnappings targeted at schools and students in Nigeria.’ This and other admonitions are the message the National President of the Senior Staff Association of Nigerian Universities (SSANU), Comrade Mohammed H. Ibrahim, in this interview with Christian Appolos, sends to President Muhammmadu Buhari-led government. Excerpts:
The education sector, the unions and their greatest challenge
Insecurity is the number one issue troubling the education sector right now. The issue of security threats in our schools across the country has become so alarming. Right now, the worst mistake government will further make is not to take serious and urgent actions to safeguard schools in the country.
Already, many parents are scared of sending their children to schools especially in the northern part of the country. To allow the situation to continue will not only affect our education sector tremendously but the image of Nigeria as a country.
It is really baffling that even as the security situation has gotten so bad and our schools now the target for the criminals, government on its own is not taking evident equal actions to mitigate the worsening situation.
Government must urgently find a lasting solution to the problem of insecurity. With the recent incessant attacks of the criminals who have chosen our schools as their best target, nobody can deny the height of vulnerability and discomfort parents, teachers and students feel.
It is an incontrovertible fact that major facets of the nation are in deplorable states making Nigeria the “giant of Africa” a laughing stock in the comity of nations. Every well-meaning Nigerian should be concerned about the state of our dear nation Nigeria, a country blessed with natural and human resources which is now a shadow of herself, ravaged and grappling with insecurity, kidnapping, banditry, rape, killings and monstrous corruption.
In strong terms, I totally condemn the absurd and unabated increase in insecurity across the country, especially the incessant abductions and demand for ransom and killings of students and staff of secondary and tertiary institutions by bandits, especially in the northern part of the country.
The recent invasion of the Nigerian Defence Academy, Kaduna was a national embarrassment and disgrace, indicating a total collapse of the security architecture of the country. This dangerous dimension has forced several states to shut down schools in violence-prone areas.
This will no doubt add to the over 13.5 million out of school children in Nigeria today. From all indications, this is a great threat to the educational system, bearing in mind that the economic growth of any nation directly depends on the level of her educational standard and stability.
I call on the Federal Government to urgently stem this ugly tide by vigorously strengthening the security agencies to ensure effective tackling of this monstrous menace. Furthermore, relevant enforceable laws should be enacted to curb this savagery.
It is high time government approved licenses for security outfits in all institutions of learning to bear firearms in order to adequately checkmate these security threats and criminal incursions.
The state of Nigerian roads can best be described as death traps. A situation where Nigerians spend an entire day travelling on deplorable roads for a supposed three-hour journey is totally unacceptable given the natural resources the country is endowed with. Hoodlums capitalize on the failed portions of the road to lay ambush on unsuspecting travellers to rob, kidnap and even kill.
The Federal Government should take urgent steps in ensuring that our highways are motorable in order to reduce the hardship and risks of the teaming citizenry who ply these roads.
Once again without mincing words, the realities on ground in terms of security in our schools right now, requires that government must equip the security unit in schools in Nigeria with firearms. The need for the security men to have firearms for the purpose of safeguarding the schools can no longer be over emphasized. This unfortunate reality is here before us and government must without hesitation, rise to the occasion and do the needful.
Interestingly, most of the men that make up security units in different schools are either retired military or policemen. This means that they already know how to handle weapons and with little training, they can do much better.
It must not get to the point where no school in Nigeria is safe for our children to attend before government will wake up and take meaningful and result oriented decisions and action. In fact, the situation is already worse; so we call on government as a matter of urgency to equip schools’ security units with weapons.
Government and labour Issues
Government in Nigeria intentionally acts insensitive towards labour issues and it is the chief cause of all the industrial crisis we experience in the country.
As you can see, the Nigerian media space is regularly awash with headlines of labour unions embarking on protests and strike actions occasioned by government’s unbridled insensitivity to the plight and welfare of workers who are co-drivers of the economy.
Most of the industrial actions are traceable to government’s refusal to honour Memorandum of Agreement or Memoranda of Action freely entered into with the trade unions. It is heart-rending that medical doctors could be on strike for over 40 days in Nigeria in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic and recent life threatening cholera outbreak ravaging the country. It is really condemnable the attitude of government in serially reneging on agreements with trade unions.
Therefore, I urge government to cultivate the habit of honouring agreements it willingly signed with labour unions to avoid these incessant strikes.
If government will engage the unions with sincerity, there will be no need for strike every now and then. The leadership of the labour unions are reasonable and responsible Nigerians who want nothing but the good of the country. So government should be sincere and also have the mind to make things better for Nigerians.
IPPIS issues and solution
IPPIS is shoddy and lopsided in the implementation of some core components of the new payment system.
From our research, we find out that the problem we are facing with IPPIS is caused by the payroll they prepare and use to make payment. Therefore, we are calling on government to hands off from preparing salary payroll of workers in the tertiary institutions.
Allow the institution’s to prepare the payroll and hand over to you. You of course will have to cross check before making payment. The core of the problem we are facing with IPPIS payment system is that it deprives workers of their actual earnings. For instance, it deprives some workers on sabbatical their salary from their mother institutions and others from their institutions of sabbatical assignment. And we have traced and found out that the problem is with the payroll from which the IPPIS pay workers.
If government will heed this advice, it will surely prevent industrial disharmony in the labour sector that is already looming due to the problems of IPPIS. The solution to the problem can easily be resolved if government will do what is necessary for the whole problems associated with the system to end.
YOU SHOULD NOT MISS THESE HEADLINES FROM NIGERIAN TRIBUNE
We Have Not Had Water Supply In Months ― Abeokuta Residents
In spite of the huge investment in the water sector by the government and international organisations, water scarcity has grown to become a perennial nightmare for residents of Abeokuta, the Ogun State capital. This report x-rays the lives and experiences of residents in getting clean, potable and affordable water amidst the surge of COVID-19 cases in the state…Â October 1st: FG issues security alert ahead of celebration
Selfies, video calls and Chinese documentaries: The things you’ll meet onboard Lagos-Ibadan train
The Lagos-Ibadan railway was inaugurated recently for a full paid operation by the Nigerian Railway Corporation after about a year of free test-run. Our reporter joined the train to and fro Lagos from Ibadan and tells his experience in this report…Â October 1st: FG issues security alert ahead of celebration
[ICYMI] Lekki Shootings: Why We Lied About Our Presence — General Taiwo
The Lagos State Judicial Panel of Inquiry probing the killings at Lekki Toll Gate, on Saturday resumed viewing of the 24hrs footage of the October 20, 2020 shooting of #EndSARS protesters by personnel of the Nigerian Army…
ICYMI: How We Carried Out The 1993 Nigerian Airways Hijack —Ogunderu
On Monday, October 25, 1993, in the heat of June 12 annulment agitations, four Nigerian youngsters, Richard Ajibola Ogunderu, Kabir Adenuga, Benneth Oluwadaisi and Kenny Razak-Lawal, did the unthinkable! They hijacked an Abuja-bound aircraft, the Nigerian Airways airbus A310, and diverted it to Niger Republic. How did they so it? Excerpts…
and then