Strike no threat to 2019 elections, says ASUU president

ACADEMIC Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) National President Prof. Biodun Ogunyemi has said the union’s strike will continue until the Federal Government pays the salary shortfall and earned allowances of his members.

He also insisted on payment of revitalisation fund of N1.1 trillion for upgrade of public universities.

Ogunyemi said contrary to the claims by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), the union’s strike would not disrupt the 2019 elections.

He called for replacement of Dr. Wale Babalakin as head of the Renegotiation Committee of the 2009 FGN-ASUU Agreement.

Speaking at a news conference at the UNILAG ASUU Secretariat yesterday, Ogunyemi said the issues that led to the strike remained unresolved because the government was insincere.

He said: “Our expectation from a very responsive and sincere government is that, by now, all outstanding issues would have been resolved to the satisfaction of both parties. Unfortunately, government is yet to show sincerity in addressing the problem.

“Compatriots of the press and the general public should please note that, as at today, there are no concrete commitments on the part of government to warrant considering the suspension of the strike; which we did all that was possible to avoid.

“The purported release of N20 billion due for release in September/October 2017, which was widely publicised by government has not been confirmed to have been received in any public university. In addition, government has not made any commitment on the sourcing and payment of the outstanding five tranches for off-setting the balance of N1.1 trillion Needs Assessment Intervention Fund for the revitalisation of public universities; despite noting some possible sources suggested by a Joint Committee of FGN and ASUU.”

Regarding the strike affecting the upcoming elections, Ogunyemi said the claim was unfounded.

“If anybody accuses us of aborting election, it is unfounded. There is no basis for it. Our strike has nothing to do with election; we have never talked about aborting election. We do not want to create problem for this country. But let government not create problem for itself,” he said.

However, Ogunyemi said the union is to meet with the INEC Chairman on January 4, 2019, in view of the role some of its members play as Returning Officers.

“INEC Chairman has called us; they want to meet us; precisely January 4. When we listen to them, we will know what to advise our members to do,” he said.

On the union’s disagreement with Babalakin, Ogunyemi accused him of being fixated on hiking tuition fees.

“There are unresolved issues about the leader of government team, Dr. Wale Babalakin, SAN. We have strong reasons to believe that the continuation of Dr. Babalakin as the head of the negotiation with ASUU would not yield good fruits.  He is ideologically fixated on tuition fees and does not agree that education is a public good. ASUU strongly objects to this. Our experience with Dr. Babalakin for over 14 months tells us that Dr. Babalakin cannot relate objectively to any of the issues in our demands at the negotiation table. We, therefore, once more, call on government to replace Dr. Wale Babalakin as the chairman of the Renegotiation Committee of the 2009 FGN-ASUU Agreement,” he said.

To speedily address the union’s demands, Ogunyemi said the government should add the Earned Academic Allowances (EAA) to the 2019 budget.

“They have to pay the outstanding balance of shortfall from salaries of our members. They have to address the EAA – the balance is now before them – at least up to 2016.  The shortest way to prevent it happening again is to mainstream it to the 2019 budget.  We have discussed that. We have a proposal on how to do that. If they mainstream and engage our members and say, ‘we owe you this X amount; but we can only pay this’; and our members consider it reasonable, we can think of what to do.

“Regarding the revitalisation fund, they said they released N20 billion. But N20 billion is a non-issue. There are five tranches outstanding since 2013. If they can release two tranches or three, we can be more confident to meet our members,” he said.