ASUU mobilises for strike, demands N1.1tn funding for varsities

The Academic Staff Union of Universities on Thursday called on the Federal Government to effect the payment of N 1 . 1 tn which had been earmarked for the funding of public universities for the last six years .
The union also said it had commenced mobilisation of its members in all the zones for a strike which it said would begin soon .

Speaking during a press briefing in Jos , the Plateau State capital , the coordinator of ASUU , Bauchi Zone , Prof . Lawan Abubakar , also faulted the claim by the Minister of Finance, Zainab Ahmed , that the Federal Government had approved the release of N 20 bn to the union , saying the union did not collect grant from the government, thus , the money was for the universities .

The zone comprises Abubakar Tafawa Balewa University, Bauchi ; Bauchi State University; Federal University, Kashere; Gombe State University; University of Jos ; and Plateau State University, Bokkos .

“What will N 20 bn do for the 64 public universities in this country ? What we want now is the N 1 . 1 tn . That is the amount that the government should release; not the N 20 bn , ” Abubakar said.

According to the documents released by ASUU, the Federal Government was to provide funds for the revitalisation of the university system between 2013 and 2018. Under the arrangement , the universities were to get N 200 bn funding in 2013 , while N 220 bn was earmarked for 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017 and 2018 .

Also , a dedicated revitalisation account was to be opened at the Central Bank of Nigeria by the Federal Government , and funds paid on a quarterly basis from which the universities would draw the funds .

But while frowning upon the refusal of the Federal Government to honour the agreement, Abubakar stated , “ I cannot be definite on the date for the commencement of the strike action . We are still mobilising . We will submit a report on this mobilisation from the various zones and the national leadership will invite the National Executive Council that will now take that decision .

“The N 20 bn claim by the Minister of Finance was one of the conditions we gave and agreed upon with government in 2017 to suspend the strike then . And the government promised that it was going to release the N 20 bn in two weeks . That was in 2017, and here we are in September 2018. When the government sensed that we were mobilising our members to take action on those issues , including the N 20 bn , which was just a palliative , it decided to be political . ”

The zone also said it was not comfortable with Wale Babalakin ( SAN ) as the leader of the government’ s renegotiation team , alleging that Babalakin had been antagonistic of the process by being absent from meetings , among other things .

He added , “ The kind of individual we want to head the government team must be a stakeholder in the Nigerian public university system and must be committed to solving the problems that we have in the university . With that and with a change in the personality that has such interest , we will simply come back to the table and continue with the renegotiation . ”

Meanwhile , the coordinator of Port Harcourt Zone of the union , Uzo Onyebinama , has described the proposed education bank and tuition scheme by the Federal Government as a ploy to commercialise public university education and serve as an incentive for private universities in the country .

Speaking with journalists at the University of Port Harcourt on Thursday , Onyebinama explained that the scheme , if approved , would deny poor people access to higher education .

He added that the Federal Government ’ s introduction of the scheme into the renegotiation of the 2009 agreement process was an attempt to blackmail the union before the students .

He, therefore , called on the Federal Government to restart the renegotiation process by reconstituting the current government team and implementing the outstanding components of the 2017 Memorandum of Agreement , while imploring governors to tackle the issue of underfunding and desist from interfering in the administration of state universities .

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