ASUU Tackles Nwajiuba over Comment on Strike
By Nafisat Bello
The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) has reprimanded the Minister of State for Education, Emeka Nwajiuba, for describing the union as “mean and wicked for shutting down universities.”
The University Ibadan Chapter of ASUU, Prof Ayo Akinwole, said in a press statement that lecturers in Nigeria have sacrificed their labour, sweat and health “only for parasites in government to come and destroy common heritage and collective patrimony.”
Nwajiuba, in an interview with a national newspaper, had said that, “there is nothing that ASUU are doing or asking for that is wrong. What we’ve consistently asked is that the government and the people of Nigeria will continue to look into the matter because if you disrupt academic sessions because of entitlements which you would eventually get but at the cost of our children getting a proper education. ‘Thats been mean’.
Akinwole, therefore, said the Minister represents one of the deceptive and insincere characters of the Buhari administration.
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According to him, it was a sign of acceptance of failure for a Minister to admit that they have been irresponsible by pleading with a union to bury the welfare of her members and not fight for infrastructure face-lift for the children of the masses and new salary for the welfare of her members.
Akinwole said the Minister should cover his head in shame for heading a ministry where the budget to education has regressed since his assumption of office, saying, “this government fails to realise that not funding education adequately is itself influencing insecurity in the country.
“ASUU has become very tolerant and tolerates suffering for the sake of students and Nigeria. We have shown understanding but this government has even failed to deliver on the timeline agreement we signed with this government. Nwajiuba’s claim is deceptive and unfounded. This is a deceptive government. They have set up 40 committees on our renegotiation since 2017 and the same government is now setting up another committee to look into what those ones did for almost four years? They are unserious, wicked and parasitic leaders,” the statement read in part.
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