A member of the National Executive Council of ASUU, Dr. Nasir Adesola, told one of our correspondents on the telephone that theN30bn offered to the striking lecturers as earned allowances was even worse than “where we were before the deadlocked meeting on Monday.” The government, he said, had not shown enough commitment towards the settlement of the conflict. According to him, the government only offered N30bn without saying anything on when the balance of the earned allowances would be paid. He also said that the declaration by the government that it had approved N100bn for the development of infrastructure in the universities was a mere propaganda. Meanwhile, the All Progressives Congress has asked the government to honour its agreement with ASUU in order to end the strike which began on July 1. The APC, in a statement on Tuesday by its Interim National Publicity Secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, said ASUU’s demand for N87bn was not open to government’s negotiation. The statement reads, ‘’The N87bn that ASUU is demanding represents earned allowances hence cannot be renegotiated. “In any case, this amount pales into insignificance when placed side by side the N1tr that has been spent on federal legislators in the past eight years; or the frivolity involved in a government minister travelling to China to negotiate a $1bn loan in a chartered jet (with its attendant costs) and with a retinue of officials who earned generous estacode in hard currency.” It said ASUU was not making any fresh demand beyond the agreement it reached with the government in 2009. “Agreements are meant to be honoured, and breaching them comes with some consequences,” the statement added. The party said while the Federal Government refused to honour its own side of the agreement with ASUU since 2009, “it could pay out N3tn in non-existent fuel subsidies to fat cats”. It added that in place of ASUU strike, the Federal Government preferred to spend N1tn annually “to maintain the jets in the Presidential fleet and do little or nothing to prevent the stealing of 400,000 barrels of crude oil per day.” It condemned the “non-chalance” of those who should be working round the clock to resolve the crisis, especially the Minister of State for Education, Nyeson Wike. The APC claimed that instead of focusing on the problem, Wike “was launching vigilance groups and dancing ‘palongo’ around town when the nation’s public universities are shut and students are languishing.” Reacting, Wike’s Special Assistant on Media, Simeon Nwakaudu, said “no administration has impacted on education like the Jonathan administration.” He said Wike had actively participated in the process of resolving the ASUU crisis, with the Federal Government team led by the SGF. ASUU - See more at: nigeriana.org/blog/news/2013/08/21/asuu-update-fg-plans-to-meet-varsity-councils-vcs.html/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Jetheights+%28Jet+Heights%29&utm_content=Yahoo%21+Mail#.dpuf
Posted on: Thu, 22 Aug 2013 07:57:04 +0000