Your survival depends on struggle, ASUU tells members

The University of Uyo chapter of the Academic Staff Union of Universities, Akwa Ibom State, has urged members of the union not to abandon the struggle to get what is due to them.

The immediate past chairman of the union, UNIUYO branch, Dr. Nwachukwu Anyim, reminded the ASUU members that there was no oppressor that would be willing to give what was due to workers without the workers struggling to get what they wanted.

Anyim stated this in Uyo during a lecture organised to commemorate the first anniversary of the death of a former president of the union, Professor Festus Ayayi, on Thursday.

He, however, regretted that some members of ASUU, who had refused to join the union during the struggle for improved working conditions, also benefitted from the collective bargaining of the union.

He said, “I plead with you to always stand and struggle together to be able to get what is due to you. There is no oppressor that will ordinarily be happy to give what is due to workers without you struggling for them.”

ASUU chairman, UNIUYO branch, Dr. Aniekan Brown, asked members not to allow the sacrifices made by Iyayi to be in vain.

He advised the members to draw inspiration from the sacrifice and show appreciation to the late leader by upholding the ideals of the union, which Iyayi lived by and died for.

The immediate past Dean, Faculty of Arts of the university, Prof. Desmond Wilson, gave credit to Iyayi for having been the writer and compiler of the ASUU manifesto and work guide known as ‘The Principles of ASUU.’

Wilson, whose lecture was entitled, ‘A contextual view of the principles of ASUU: In memory of Comrade (Professor) Festus Iyayi,’ challenged his colleagues to exhibit accountability to their members and the Nigerian people at large in their actions and decisions.

Iyayi, who was a one-time chairman of ASUU at the University of Benin and National President of the Union, died in a vehicle accident in the convoy of Kogi State Governor, Idris Wada on November 12, 2013 on his way to attend a National Executive Committee Meeting of ASUU in Kano.