ASUU Alleges that Gbajabiamila Tricked Them into Suspending the Strike
The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) has accused the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Femi Gbajabiamila, of deceiving the union by making a promise to offset the arrears of salaries members were owed if the union called off its eight-month-old strike in October.
ASUU President, Prof Emmanuel Osodeke, made this known in an exclusive interview with Tribune Online when asked about the speaker’s intervention and the current situation of their issues with the Federal Government.
According to Osodeke, ASUU engaged the Speaker in discussion as a welcome intervention to resolve the stalemate between the union and the Federal Government. Gbajabiamila even presented a paper signed by him to ASUU leadership indicating the seriousness of the government to pay in full the eight-month salaries its members were owed and attend to some other matters.
Based on the Speaker’s intervention, ASUU suspended the strike with the hope that the Speaker’s words would be matched with action. However, nothing has been done over the promise, and ASUU members’ collective impression of Gbajabiamila is that he tricked them to go back to work and sort things out immediately thereafter.
Osodeke stressed that the Speaker needs to prove ASUU wrong on its impression by simply working out the implementation of his promises to the union. He also criticized the judiciary for hurriedly passing judgment on their matter with the Federal Government by asking ASUU members to go back to work and then adjourning the case till January 26.
Osodeke described the outgoing year as a very bad one for the education sector in Nigeria, noting that great damage had really been done to the sector especially in the last year and across levels by the current administration.
He prayed that the next government would be courageous enough to declare a state of emergency in the sector and fix the mess that he said would take up to four or five years to clear.