With the recent suspension of the three-month-old industrial action by the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), it is hoped that sustainable peace will prevail on campuses. The leadership of ASUU suspended the strike after reaching a new agreement with the Federal Government at the end of the conciliatory meeting with the Minister of Labour and Employment, Dr. Chris Ngige, and his Education counterpart, Malam Adamu Adamu. We recall that ASUU embarked on strike on November 4, 2018 over the non-implementation of the Memorandum of Action (MOA) it signed with the Federal Government.
Before the strike was suspended, the Federal Government released N20 billion for the payment of Earned Academic Allowances and others. The government also promised to release N25 billion as Revitalisation Fund between April and May 2019 as well as commence the implementation of the 2009 Memorandum of Understanding (MoU). It also gave the universities the licence to run their own pension scheme known as the Nigerian University Employees Pension Company (NUPENCO).
According to the 2013 MoU, Nigerian universities needed N1.3 trillion for revitalisation in five years. The money would be disbursed annually in tranches of N200 billion (2013), N220 billion (2014), N220 billion (2015), N220 billion (2016), N220 billion (2017) and N220 billion in 2018. It was based on this agreement that the administration of former president, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan, released N200 billion to the universities in 2013.
While it is commendable that ASUU and the government have agreed on some of the contentious issues that led to the strike, we urge the government to ensure that the agreement is faithfully implemented. We say this because of government’s penchant to renege on its agreement with ASUU and other unions in tertiary institutions.
Let government show more commitment and honour the agreement it willingly entered into with the union. There is need for industrial peace and harmony on these campuses so that our university calendar can be predictable and students benefit from adequate teaching from their lecturers.
We lament the incessant strikes in the nation’s public universities and call on the lecturers to find other non-disruptive strategy to settle any industrial dispute with the government in future. There is need for stability in the nation’s universities. We do not want a situation where the lecturers will again embark on another strike after some months of teaching on account of another non-implementation of agreement. We have indeed seen this scenario play out before and we don’t want a repeat. At the heart of all strikes in the universities is the issue of poor funding. If government can address this problem, it is believed that the incessant strikes will no longer take place. Currently, the government’s annual budget for education is still very low. There is nothing wrong if government can substantially increase the budget for education by 26 per cent or more.
We believe that Nigeria can achieve industrial and technological development if the public universities are adequately funded. Most industrilised nations in Europe and America allocate enough funds to education. We can emulate them. Besides, the varsities should think of alternative ways to enhance their internally generated revenues.
We believe that this is the way out of the incessant and disruptive strikes in our tertiary institutions. Ordinarily, strike as a bargaining tool ought to be the last resort. But in our case, it has been overused to the extent that it has lost its essence.
It is a fact that strike now threatens the integrity of our educational system and has negatively impacted on the perception of the certificates that are awarded from our institutions as well as their products. To ensure enduring industrial peace in the universities, the Federal Government should faithfully implement its agreements with ASUU.