The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) is considering the offers tabled before them by the Federal Government to end the ongoing strike.
The strike embarked upon on February 14 has entered its sixth month.
The National Executive Council of the striking ASUU will meet on Sunday, August 28, 2022, to decide on whether to suspend or continue with the industrial action.
Some members of the union have confirmed to newsmen that the University union will hold another meeting on Sunday at the UNIABUJA to discuss the terms of the offer and whether to call off the strike or not,
The union had demanded the renegotiation of the ASUU-FGN 2009 agreement; release of revitalization funds for universities; deployment of the University Transparency Accountability System for the payment of salaries and allowances of university lecturers; release of earned allowances; and the release of the white paper report of the visitation panels to universities.
“The NEC meeting will hold on August 28, the four weeks ultimatum that we gave is expiring that same day. We will be making our decisions based on the results of the state congresses.
“The NEC has to depend on the result of the congresses. The zones have held their congresses; the branch chairmen will also talk to their members and they will get feedback which will be transmitted to the NEC,” one of the sources said.
Confirming the date of the NEC meeting to our correspondent, the chairperson, ASUU, Federal University of Technology, Minna, Dr. Gbolahan Bolarin, simply said, “Yes, Sunday.”
In a bid to end the strike, the government had set up a negotiation team led by the Pro-Chancellor of the Federal University of Lokoja, Nimi Briggs, to look into negotiations with the unions.
ASUU has demanded the payment of the backlog of six months’ salaries owed them by the Federal Government.
However, the Federal Ministry of Education on, Monday refuted claims it would proscribe ASUU, saying the claim is baseless and untrue.
The ministry also noted that the failure of the union to call off its strike despite the interventions of the government was unreasonable.
This was made known by the ministry’s spokesperson, Ben Goong in Abuja on Monday.
There were reports in the media that the government was planning to proscribe the union and drag it to the National Industrial Court over the strike.
Reacting, Goong said, “We are not aware of such plans. The minister gave all the updates during his press briefing with State House correspondents. If there were plans to take further steps, he would have noted it.
“As regards the next steps, the government has already inaugurated a committee to harmonize the IPPIS, UTAS, and UP3; this will ensure that the government will pay with only one payment platform that will harmonize all the technical peculiarities.
“The government has also rolled out its achievements. A total of N2.5 trillion has been expended in the tertiary education sector in the past 10 years, which is even much more than the amount in the 2009 agreement. The issues about salary adjustment have also been attended to.
“If you bring some demands and almost 80% has been attended to, there is no need to drag the strike anymore. It is unreasonable for the strike to be lingering, seeing as the government has worked towards fulfilling most of the demands.
Meanwhile, some universities like Gombe state university and Kaduna state University have pulled out of the strike and announced their resumption date.