The President, Academic Staff Union of
Universities (ASUU), Prof. Emmanuel Osodeke has said that the union is willing
to end its seven-month old strike.
Osodeke, however, said this could only
be achieved if concrete agreements were reached with the Federal Government.
Osodeke gave the assurance in Abuja on
Thursday at a National Town Hall Meeting on Tertiary Education tagged: ‘The Locked Gates of our Citadels -A National
Emergency.’
The Federal Government recently sued ASUU at the industrial court in an
attempt to end the strike.
“On all these issues, we have given the
government a minimum that we can accept, but they have not responded on issue
of revitilisation, on issue of earned
allowance and on issues that we have all discussed.
“We negotiated and agreed that they should
sign and this is very simple, not more than one day.
”On UTAS and IPPIS , we say release the
report of the test you did and let’s look at the one who came first and take it
as we agreed.
”So we have given them the minimum we want and we have to come down
and they can do it in one day if there is a will,” he said.
Osodeke, therefore, reiterated the union’s
commitment to return to school if the
Federal Government puts its proposal on the
table, saying that negotiation could be reached if the government was willing.
“If the government loves this country, these children and their parents, then they should
come to the table and let us resolve these issues in one day.
“Just as we did in 2014, they should come and ensure
that we do that, we can even have the meeting openly so that Nigeria will see
what we are discussing,” he said.
The ASUU president expressed sadness over
the lingering strike resulting to government taking the union to court.
He said that suing the union was not an
option as it would further worsen the situation of the students and tertiary
education in the country.
He said that if the court forces the
lecturers to return to school, they won’t force them to teach with open minds,
saying that the students would definitely be at the receiving end.
Osodeke commended the Committee of Vice
Chancellors and Pro-Chancellors for stepping in to resolve the issues..
He, therefore, called on parents and
students to appeal to the government to do the needful so that the strike would
come to an end once and for all, rather than attacking the union.
Meanwhile, Vivian Bello , Convener, Save
Public Education Campaign, an NGO, pleaded with both parties to resolve the
problems saying that the students are not the only people feeling the negative
impact, but also the union.
Bello said that it behooves on both sides
to bring the crisis to a perpetual end for the sake of the students as well as
the development of education in the country.
”We are going to play our traditional role
which is the role of monitor.