WHILST WE AWAIT STRIKE-VERDICT FROM ASUU, READ WHAT HAPPENED IN FG/ASUU MEETING YESTERDAY

PRESIDENT Goodluck Jonathan, on Monday, held a long meeting with the leadership of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), at the Presidential Villa, Abuja. As of the time of going to press around 11.30 p.m, the meeting, which started around 2.45 p.m, was still ongoing.
ASUU, it will be...
recalled, commenced strike to press home its demands
and fulfilment on the part of the government, the agreement they
both signed in 2009.
Leaders of the striking ASUU, on Monday, abandoned the cozy conference
hall of the First Lady wing of the Presidential Villa, venue of their
meeting with President Goodluck Jonathan, to meet inside a Toyota bus
to consider proposal put before them in a meeting with the president.
They had been locked in the meeting with the president for about three
and half hours before emerging, only to hop into the bus parked
outside the venue, apparently to have a private discussion that could
not be monitored by government agents.

The initial meeting with the president commenced at about 2.45 p.m and
lasted till
about 6.30 p.m, after which the president left for his residence,
while the ASUU leaders walked out of the First Lady's wing, only to
enter the parked bus to continue their deliberation over what had been
put before them by the president. When State House correspondents made
attempts to get the lecturers to talk, some of them replied that they
would return to continue their discussions
with the
president.
They did disembark from the bus
after about 24 minutes to return to
the meeting and were later joined by President
Jonathan. The meeting continued till late in
the night. Before the commencement of the
meeting, President Jonathan had, in a lighter
mood, told them that all the contending issues must be resolved during
the meeting to enable students to go back to school. While exchanging
pleasantries with ASUU president, he said "my
president, all the problems will be over today. Our
children must go back to school.
With you here, we are covered. It is signed, sealed
and delivered." With President Jonathan were Vice President Namadi
Sambo; Secretary to
Government of the Federation (SGF), Senator Pius Ayim; Coordinating
Minister for the Economy and Minister of Finance, Dr Ngozi
Okonjo-Iweala; Minister of Labour, Chief Emeka Nwogu; Supervising
Minister of Education, Nyesom Wike and the Executive Secretary,
National Universities Commission (NUC),
Professor Julius Okojie. On the ASUU side were its national president,
Dr Nasir Fagge, Professor
Festus Iyayi, Professor Dipo Fashina and
Professor Abdulahi Sule Kano, who were joined by president of the
Nigeria Labour Congress(NLC), Abdulwaheed Omar;
his Trade Union Congress (TUC) counterpart,
Bobboi Kaigama, among others. Earlier, a meeting between Senate
President, David Mark and the union leadership did not yield the
desired result.
Mark had been mandated by the Senate, about two weeks ago, to mediate
in the disagreement between the unversity lecturers and the Federal
Government, over the non- implementation of the 2009 agreement by the
government.
Speaking with newsmen after a closed-door session with Senator Mark,
ASUU president, Dr Fagge, said the intervention by the Senate
president was a welcome development in the effort to get the crisis
sorted out and for the
universities to be re-opened.
Before the closed-door meeting, Senator Mark said "as you are aware, I
have been mandated by the Senate to meet with you and the Federal
Government to resolve this crisis as soon as possible, so that the
children will go back to the
classrooms and I believe that is what you also
want." Dr Fagge, on his part, noted that "members of ASUU are not just
lecturers, we are also parents and also among us, we have students who
are pursuing post-graduate degrees. So this strike
directly affects us negatively."