No public varsity exempted from ongoing strike ― ASUU

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5 years ago

The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) has said it expects all public universities in the country to join its ongoing two-week warning strike.

The union declared the industrial action on Monday to protest, among others the non-implementation of the long-pending Memorandum of Action by the Federal Government and the non-payment of salaries of members who refused to enrol in the Federal Government’s Integrated Personnel and Payroll Information System (IPPIS).

Speaking to our correspondent exclusively on Thursday, the Coordinator of Lagos Zone of the union, comprising of up to six universities, Prof Olusiji Sowande said the purpose of the industrial action is holistic and for the benefit of not only the lecturers and students in public universities but, also that of the entire public university education in the country.

“So, we don’t expect any public university to exempt itself from the warning strike,” he maintained.

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Sowande, who teaches at the Federal University of Agriculture Abeokuta (FUNAB), said the union had resolved to impose sanctions on its branches that have not joined the strike.

He, however, pointed out the possibility of a few universities which he said are in union crisis not to join the strike.

He named the Lagos State University, Ojo and the Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife where a section of lecturers backed out of ASUU, as among those likely not to join.

“But they will all be sanctioned for going against ASUU directive,” he emphasised.

On the declaration by the Minister of Labour, Dr Chris Ngige, that the industrial action is illegal, Sowande said the minister is not correct in his claim.

He said all is a propaganda of the Federal Government as the issues upon which ASUU declared the warning strike ahead of a full-blown strike if nothing is done, are not a new but same old story.

“It is when we are talking about fresh issues that he can be saying that,’ he noted.