THE Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) has expressed optimism that it may soon call off the industrial action embarked upon by its members nearly eight months ago.
Chairman of the Union Emmanuel Osodeke, disclosed this while speaking during a meeting with executives and members of the House of Representatives on Monday.
He noted that the intervention of the National Assembly had influenced the union’s optimism and expressed gratitude to the legislators.
“If the way the National Assembly has intervened, we had done that long ago, or those in charge of labour and education had done exactly this, we would not be where we are today. We would not have stayed more than two or three weeks on this strike. There is strike all over the world — UK, US, all over — but they don’t allow it to last.
“So, once again, thank you very much and we hope that working together, in the next few days, we can put an end to this particular imbroglio in the Nigerian educational system.”
“In few days, we will put this Strike to an end”
ASUU President commends intervention of the Leadership of @HouseNGR led by Speaker @femigbaja pic.twitter.com/ugdDwljMOi
— House of Reps NGR (@HouseNGR) October 10, 2022
Staff of public universities in Nigeria had downed tools on February 14 over recurring disagreements with the federal government.
The union identified the failure of the government to implement the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) and Memorandum of Action (MoA) signed between both parties as one of the reasons for the strike action.
Other reasons include poor commitment to payment of academic earned allowance (EAA) and refusal to adopt the Universities Transparency and Accountability Solution (UTAS).
Ijeoma Opara is a journalist with The ICIR. Reach her via vopara@icirnigeria.org or @ije_le on Twitter.