ASUU SET TO SUSPEND STRIKE THIS WEEK

Indications have emerged that the  Academic Staff Union of
Universities may call off the over four-month-old strike on Thursday.
Barring a last-minute change, the National Executive Committee of ASUU will meet on Wednesday night to consider the position of the
congresses of the over 50 public universities on the offer made by the...

Federal government to revamp the institutions.
The  union met with  a Federal Government team led by President
Goodluck Jonathan last Tuesday in Abuja.
The  ASUU leadership, after briefing the zonal coordinators  on  the
offer, had directed the local branches   to organise  congress
meetings between Friday last week and Tuesday (tomorrow).
This is to enable all the lecturers to make input into the action the
union would take after its NEC meeting on Thursday.
However, feelers from most universities that had organised their
congresses revealed that ASUU  would suspend the strike after the
Thursday NEC meeting.
In  some universities, including the Obafemi Awolowo University and
the Lagos State University that have scheduled their congress meetings
for Monday (today),  union leaders and lecturers expressed hope that
the strike would end this week.
Also, some top officials of the union in some of the nine zones of
ASUU said even though they were not happy with the plan by the
government to inject N220bn yearly into the public universities for
the next five years, they were pleased that a commitment had been
obtained by the union.
Though the Ibadan Zonal Coordinator of ASUU, Dr. Nasir Adesola,
confirmed that the NEC meeting would hold on Wednesday, he did not say
whether the strike would be called off or not.
"Yes, the NEC will hold on Wednesday evening but ASUU has a process
which we are going to follow. NEC reserves the right to call off the
strike after due consultation with members and this is why congresses
are being called in all the chapters of the union. Please, wait till
after the congress," he told one of our correspondents on the
telephone.
But another  source said, "Our NEC meeting will hold between Wednesday
night and Thursday. Our chapters have started holding meetings to
discuss the Federal Government's offer. This is to allow input from
all the lecturers. We have to carry them along to avoid disunity since
there are moves by some elements to infiltrate us."
Another source told one of our correspondents that some members had
expressed mixed feelings about the Federal Government's  new offer
based on its refusal to honour  past  agreements.
"The radicals among us are  sceptical about this latest offer. They do
not believe that government will respect the agreement. Their view is
that government only wants  to deceive the union to call off the
strike before it will jettison it."
A top official of the union,  who confirmed the fears,  told one of
our correspondents that although members' opinions at the zonal
congresses were divided over the government's offer, the majority
still decided to give  the government the benefit of the doubt.
He also said that  the majority opinion was that the review of the
agreement which was supposed to hold this year should be postponed
till next year in the interest of peace.
 The official added, "Members were persuaded because President
Goodluck Jonathan personally met with the union. They felt since the
President was involved in the negotiation this time around, the
government would not say that it was arm-twisted to make the offer.
"This is the problem we are having with the 2009 agreement. By now we
should be talking about a review but we are still having troubles with
implementation.
"Although feelers across the zones are that we should call off the
strike, we are going to put down the government offer in black and
white and make it public so that nobody accuses us tomorrow  of
asking for too much."
Some universities are expected to hold their congresses on Monday
(today) to discuss the outcome of the zonal congresses held at nine
centres across the country last week.
A source at the meeting  between the government and ASUU   told one of
our  correspondents  that the government after a long debate agreed to
inject N220bn yearly for the next five years beginning from 2014.
He had said, "The meeting should be the longest that we have ever had
on this crisis but I can tell you that both parties were frank all
through the discussions. The parties also showed commitment towards
ending the crisis. The President in particular showed that he was
serious about ending the strike and that was why he offered to release
over N1tn to the universities in the next five years.
"The money will be released on a yearly basis at N220bn per annum
beginning from 2014. For the outgoing year, the Federal Government
will only release N100bn and this has been processed.
"In order to show commitment to this deal, the money will be kept at
the Central Bank of Nigeria  and will be released on a quarterly basis
to the universities. So, there won't be any problem about funding the
deal."
The source added that the National Universities Commission and the
Trade Union Congress would be joint guarantors of  the new agreement
while the Minister of Education would be the implementation officer.
He said  that the  government  also agreed, among other things, to
revamp the public universities by ensuring that all the issues that
always lead to strike were dealt with once and for all.