An uneasy calm has now enveloped the nation’s universities following a two-week warning strike declared by the leadership of the Academic Union of Universities (ASUU) over non-payment of salaries to lecturers who failed to enrol into the Federal Government Integrated Personnel and Payroll Information System (IPPIS) and other outstanding agreement.
Addressing a press conference on Monday at Danic Hotel, Enugu, shortly after rising from their two-day National Executive Council (NEC) meeting at the Enugu State University of Science and Technology, (ESUT), the National President of ASUU, Comrade Biodun Ogunyemi, disclosed that the industrial action began on March 9.
Comrade Ogunyemi who read the communique stated that the strike action is to compel the Federal Government to implement the outstanding agreement and resolution of Memorandum of Action it had with the union from 2009, 2013, 2017 and 2019.
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According to him, “Having discussed the provisions in the 2009 ASUU-FGN agreement, the 2013 Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) and the 2017 Memorandum of Action (MoA) which have not been implemented, NEC resolved to embark on two weeks warning strike action with effect from Monday 9th March 2020, to compel the Government to implement the agreement and resolution.
The ASUU boss further said, “having discussed the provisions in the 2009 ASUU-FGN Agreement, the 2013 Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) and the 2017 Memorandum of Action (MoA), which have not been implemented, the NEC resolved to embark on two-week warning strike action with effect from Monday, 9th March 2020 to compel the Federal Government to implement the agreement and resolution of Memorandum of Action”
He noted that the Federal Government’s attempt to dictate what happens in the Nigerian university system erodes the autonomy of our universities, making them incapable of delivering on respective mandates in teaching, research and service.
“The imposition of the obnoxious Integrated Personnel and Payroll Information System (IPPIS) on universities, despite its demonstrated shortcomings”, he added.
He said as a union of intellectuals driven by the patriotic quest for national development, based on the principles of equity, probity and fairness, they took a critical look at the state of the Nigerian universities, the increasingly parlous state of the polity with attendant adverse consequences for the ordinary Nigerians, the mindless betrayal of Nigerians by the ruling class, which has resulted in crippling poverty across the nation, and the state of Nigerian public universities.
On the state of the nation, Ogunyemi described the state of insecurity in the country as alarming, stressing that armed robbery, kidnapping, hostage-taking of all kinds, banditry, militancy, herdsmen/farmers clashes, and insurgency had become so rife that they appear to have overwhelmed our security agencies, despite huge budgetary allocations to security.
His words: “ASUU calls on the Federal Government to a matter of urgency overhaul the nation’s security architecture. The failure of the Federal Government to ensure the security of Nigerian citizens had led to the emergence of sporadic security outfits. This is a sign that the Federal Government has failed to protect Nigerian citizens as stipulated in the Constitution of Nigeria.
“The failure of Government to ensure social justice, wealth and employment creation and accountable, responsive and responsible governance at all levels, is no doubt, at the root of pervasive insecurity problems. We call on the Federal Government to give attention to this dimension of the solution”
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