“Why Should A State University Lecturer Go On Strike For A Federal Problem”

President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan during the
yesterday presidential media chat described
the strike by university lecturers as
unfortunate, declaring that the action has
serious political undertone.
“Why should a state university lecturer go on
strike for a federal problem? The president
queried.
The president noted that the strike had
political colouration giving the commitment of
the current administration to address the
challenges of university education and the
refusal of ASUU to call off the strike despite
the fact that government has conceded to
many of their demands in the 2009 agreement.
Jonathan, however, stressed that there are
some items in the agreement that are
implementable such as the demand for
transfer of government landed property to
universities .
The earned allowances, the President explained
are supposed to be paid from the internally
generated revenues of the universities .
He added that as part of government
commitment to transform the nation’s
universities, he set up Needs Assessment
Committee who visited all public universities in
Nigeria to take inventory of the institutions.
He regretted that ASUU has failed to recognize
government in this direction, insisting that
there have been many strikes in this country
and those strikes were without such
commitment as demonstrated his government .
Even though, he stated that his commitment is
total to make changes, but he hinted at the
need to revisit our labour laws because of the
excesses of the trade unions.
“We will begin to look at the labour laws
because of the excesses of labour unions,” he
said.
President Jonathan used the occasion to call on
the Academic Staff Union of Universities to call
off the strike in the interest of Nigeria and the
children.