After much deliberation, President Muhammadu Buhari has directed Minister of Education Mallam Adamu Adamu to end the industrial actions with the striking Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU).
The President ordered the Minister of Labour and Employment, Dr. Chris Ngige, to hands off negotiations with ASUU, with the government ready to meet most of their demands.
Ngige’s role will only be limited to a conciliator when it is necessary.
ASUU had repeatedly accused Ngige of blackmail and being a stumbling block to the negotiations.
Buhari, who gave the directive during a briefing by the heads of the various concerned ministries, departments, and agencies of government on Tuesday in Abuja, also okayed the suggestion by the Minister of Education, Adamu Adamu, to take over the negotiations.
Mr Adamu was said to have complained to the gathering the reason behind his prolonged silence on the matter, saying his labour and employment counterpart had since 2016 argued “that only the labour ministry has the mandate to negotiate with striking workers unions in Nigeria.”
At Tuesday’s briefing, the concerned ministries, agencies and departments of government gave the status of the negotiations to the President.
Those at the meeting with the president were the ministers of education, finance, labour, and communications and digital economy, Adamu Adamu, Zainab Ahmed, Mr Ngige and Isa Pantami respectively.
Others were the Head of Service of the Federation, Folashade Yemi-Esan; Chairman of the National Salaries Income and Wages Commission, Ekpo Nta, and the Director-General of Budget Office, Ben Akabueze.
A source at the meeting said that the President directed that the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Boss Mustapha, and Mr Ngige should only serve as observer and conciliators at the resolution meetings.
The source further explained that the education minister has promised to immediately begin a series of meetings with ASUU to resolve the crisis as soon as possible.
The source said: “The minister has consistently explained that the agreement reached with the previous administration on the release of about N1.3 trillion to the university system is not realistic but that something around a quarter of such can be worked out.
“Also, in the salary structure being negotiated, the minister is open to paying a professor a salary not less than N1 million. That will be tabled before relevant agencies of government to arrive at implementable proposals so that the unions can take them to their members for consideration.”
The source said because the minister believes the lecturers are patriotic Nigerians, the matter could be resolved.
“So the President, agreed to this and asked him to take immediate action. ”
ASUU President Prof Emmanuel Osodeke and his predecessor, Dr Nasir Fagge, at a briefing at ASUU National Headquarters in Abuja, said the union was waiting for the signing of the agreement that was reached.
According to Fagge, the union was waiting for the government to give approval to the Briggs committee to sign the draft deal.
He said: “We have negotiated with a duly mandated committee appointed by the government and we have reached a draft agreement.
“We are waiting for this committee to get the final nod of the Federal Government to sign off this agreement and commence implementation.
“However, the 100 per cent pay rise proposal is not before us.
“If the government has this proposal, it knows the channels through which it will forward it to us and at that point, we will look at it and decide appropriately.
“We started this process in 2017 when there was a problem with the Wale Babalakin Committee.
“The government itself removed him and replaced him with another (Prof Jubril Munzali) committee.
“We reached an agreement, but the government said it had a problem with that agreement.
“They reconstituted the committee again, led by Nimi Briggs, and we have concluded this system.
“All we are waiting for is the final consultation with those that gave the two parties the mandate to negotiate.”
Osodeke said the union would not be stampeded or blackmailed.
He also said the government did not need two weeks to end the strike as President Buhari mandated Adamu to ensure.
Osodeke insisted that the union would call off the strike once the government agreed to sign the re-negotiated 2009 agreement.
He said ASUU would not be blackmailed or be stampeded by lies against it by Ngige.
“They stopped our salaries thinking they will make us go back to work. Let them sit down as directed by the President,” he said.