The vice-chancellors of public universities in the country and the parents have expressed great displeasure over the extension of industrial action by the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) by two months, describing the action as a sad development.
ASUU on Monday announced the extension of its one-month warning strike by two months, blaming the non-response of the Federal Government to its demands within the four weeks given as a reason.
The vice-chancellors and the parents under the aegis of the Committee of Vice-Chancellors of Nigerian Universities(CVCNU) as well as the National Parent-Teacher Association of Nigeria (NPTAN) said the Federal Government should have by all means averted even the initial one-month warning strike by ASUU let alone allowing the action to be extended again by two months as the union has now done.
Speaking to Nigerian Tribune in a separate interview on Monday, the chairman of CVCNU who is also the vice-chancellor of the University of Ilorin( UNILORIN), Prof Sulyman Age Abdulkareem and the NPTAN’s National President, Alhaji Haruna Danjuma said even though there was no anytime they are in support of ASUU embarking on strike as such action would certainly disrupt academic calendar and also have serious adverse consequences, particularly on students and Nigeria’s future, they expected that both ASUU and the Federal Government ought to have resolved their differences before the one- month warning strike elapsed.
They said quality education is key to meaningful development in any society and can only be delivered in a stable academic environment and therefore Nigeria as a country and also the people at the corridors of power cannot pretend not to know this.
They both said students were always at the receiving end of industrial actions by their teachers and inaction of governments on their constitutional roles to the people.
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The NPTAN boss, for example, said it was terrible that apart from students and parents had made a series of appeals, particularly to the federal government not to allow the situation to get to the level it is, the committee of VCs, religious leaders and other relevant stakeholders had made similar appeals to the government, yet nothing tangible was done up till now.
He said it was more pathetic that the National Assembly as we as the state governors did not make the concrete effort to mediate between the two parties and find a lasting solution to their repeated disagreements.
On his part, while CVCNU’s chairman, Prof Age acknowledged the relevance of ASUU’s demands to quality service in the Nigerian university system and its products, he said CVCNU’s position remains the same and that is ASUU should give the government more time to address the issues at stake.
According to him, ASUU is fighting a just cause as all the academics in the public universities are all affected by the issues they put to the table but then they need to give the government more time to address them.
But when asked about VCs position between the controversial UTAS and IPPIS, he said he is among the vice-chancellors invited to witness the demonstration of UTAS by ASUU and that the platform works very well.
He said the only thing expected is that if there are lapses in the package, those who will use the platform should be tutored by ASUU as the designer of the platform and that shouldn’t be a problem.
He said all their prayers as vice-chancellors is for normalcy to restore immediately to the universities, particularly in the interest of the students.
and then