The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) has asked the Federal Government to act on its outstanding issues to avert another strike.
The union said that feelers across campuses indicated that lecturers in Nigerian public universities are not happy.
In a statement issued on Saturday in Abuja and signed by its President, Prof. Christopher Piwuna, the union warned that morale among lecturers across the country is at an all-time low.
It accused successive governments of making endless promises through multiple Memoranda of Understanding (MoUs) and Memoranda of Action (MoAs) without implementing agreed resolutions.
According to ASUU, Nigerian lecturers continue to work under dire conditions, teaching on “empty stomachs,” conducting research without access to essential journals, books, chemicals, and reagents, and struggling to meet personal and family obligations amid rising costs.
The Union lamented that lecturers are forced to engage with communities and agencies in rickety cars while encumbered by utility bills, children’s fees, house rents, family upkeep and a legion of other unmet responsibilities.
“Yet elite Nigerians are quick to blame the universities for ‘producing unemployable graduates’ and failure to initiate innovative research for addressing the country’s problems. Our members feel forgotten, shamed and demoralised by past and present governments.
The union accused government officials of disregarding the principles of collective bargaining enshrined in International Labour Organisation (ILO) Conventions 98 and 154. It noted that the failure to conclude the renegotiation of the 2009 FGN-ASUU Agreement, despite a draft being submitted to the government in December 2024, exemplifies the administration’s lack of commitment.
ASUU said every major dispute it has had with government since 2012 has been rooted in violations of the agreement’s provisions on conditions of service, funding, university autonomy, and academic freedom, as well as the review of laws governing the National Universities Commission (NUC) and the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB).
The statement also condemned what it described as political interference in the appointment of vice chancellors, citing the case of the Acting Vice Chancellor of Alvan Ikoku University of Education, whose promotions, the union claimed, were fraught with irregularities.
It reads: “Nigerian governments have distracted and deceived university lecturers for too long. They push academics to the point of a strike, and turn around to withhold their salaries…When a government punishes its citizens for demanding what is due to them, can it have any moral claim to democratic culture? Where public officials and bureaucrats have the license to undervalue their country’s intellectual assets will the hope of a knowledge-driven economy not elude the nation?”
According to ASUU, “For the umpteenth time, ASUU invites all genuine patriots to prevail on Nigeria’s Federal and State Governments to address all lingering labour issues in the Nigerian University System to avert another looming industrial crisis.
“Nigerian academics are tired of governments’ excuses which have only left them with a long list of Memoranda of Understanding/Memoranda of Action (MoUs/MoAs) – 2013, 2017, 2019, 2020 – and kept them talking over the renegotiation of the 2009 Agreement for upward of eight years! No memorandum or ‘discussion’ can take the place of a Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) which fully addresses staff welfare issues and the requisite environment for productive academic work.”
Credit: punchng.com
