#ASUU To #BUHARI: Allow #Osinbajo Handle ASUU- FG Negotiations—The Genius Media Nigeria reports that the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) has asked President Muhammadu Buhari to allow the Vice President, Yemi Osinbajo handle the ASUU- FG negotiations from now on.
The body attributed this request to the fact that the Labour and Education Ministers cannot make it work.
TGM gathered that this was made known in ASUU recent tweet on their official social media page, @ASUU_NGN.
“@ASUUNGR tells Buhari to direct Vice President, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo, to handle the negotiations since the Education and Labour Ministers cannot make it work,” the body said.
The Union also revealed that the Minister of State for Education, Chukwuemeka Nwajiuba had asked the Union to trust the FG and suspend the strike for negotiations to continue.
“Meanwhile, the minister of state for Education, Mr. Chukwuemaka Nwajiuba is urging @ASUUNGR to trust the Federal Government, and first of all, suspend the strike before negotiations will continue,” they said.
TGM had reported that the ASUU President, Emmanuel Osodeke faulted the Presidential bid of the Minister of Labour, Chris Ngige, and that of Nwajiuba.
He called Ngige a biased conciliator and Nwajiuba a comedian.
“On Nwajiuba’s presidential ambition, Osodeke said: “You know there are people you call comedians, they pretend a lot and they can do anything. I think that is exactly what he (Nwajiuba) is doing. You can’t run a Ministry as the deputy when the Minister is not around, and you want to run the country. We have jokers in this country and that is exactly what I think,” he said.
He added that it is because Nwajiuba has amassed a lot of wealth while in office that he could afford to pay the N100 million required to purchase the APC nomination and expression of interest forms.
The ASUU President also reacted to Ngige’s recent interview where he described himself as a conciliator who had done what many other public officers could not do to forestall the ongoing industrial action by ASUU.
Osodeke said the minister cannot be considered a conciliator because he is loyal to the government and a conciliator is meant to be independent of both parties in any issue.
“By all standards, that Minister is not a conciliator. A conciliator should be someone who is independent on both sides, but he is a government minister that is even contesting for the presidency.
“You can’t be on one side and say you want to solve an issue for both sides. He is working for his employer, he is not a conciliator. If you call him a conciliator, then he’s a biased conciliator,” he said.
ASUU has been on strike since February 14th, 2022, to intensify its demands which include the renegotiation of its 2009 agreement with the government and deployment of the University Transparency and Accountability Solution (UTAS) to replace the Federal Government’s Integrated Personnel Payroll Information System (IPPIS).
ASUU President, Emmanuel Osodeke, had told THE WHISTLER in an earlier interview that the strike might be extended by 4 months if the government failed to meet the union’s demands before the proposed end of the current one.
Some of the demands of the university lecturers include payment of earned academic allowances, funds for the revitalization of public universities, promotion arrears, and poor funding of state universities.
ASUU has also insisted on the release of the reports of the government’s visitation panels to federal universities and regular payment of salary to lecturers.
