Emmanuel Osodeke, President of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), said he was disappointed with the comment by Festus Keyamo, Minister of State for Labor and Employment, on the union’s ongoing strike.
Osodeke spoke on Monday during an interview with Channels Television.
ASUU has been on strike since February 14 over the government’s failure to implement its demands on lecturer salaries and allowances and improved university funding.
Speaking on the union strike, Keyamo, in an interview with Channels TV on August 5asked parents to beg university professors to call off their strike.
The minister added that the federal government will not be blackmailed by the ASUU to borrow 1.2 trillion naira to meet the demands of the union.
“You cannot allow a sector of the economy to hold your jugular and blackmail you to go and borrow 1.2 trillion naira for overheads when our total income is around 6.1 trillion naira. naira, and you have roads, health centers to build and other areas to take care of,” Keyamo said.
Reacting to Keyamo’s comment, Osodeke said the union did not go on strike for the welfare of teachers, but for the condition of Nigeria’s public universities.
“For us as a union, we are not talking about ASUU. We are talking about the Nigerian university system which has practically collapsed in such a way that you do not see students from all over the world coming to Nigerian universities as students,” said the President of ASUU.
“You don’t see lecturers from all over the world coming to Nigeria to teach, while Nigerian lecturers and students are all moving out of the country en masse. This is why we are on strike. It’s not about our well-being; it is this system.
“Are we proud of this system? Keyamo, who had spoken, will he allow his children to be educated in Nigerian universities? That’s the comical thing that I saw when he was talking and to me why I felt so disappointed is that he’s somebody, before he joined this partisan politics he was there. one of those on the street.
