The Federal Government and the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) on Monday failed to reach final agreement on issues surrounding the threat by the union to call an all-out strike.
The union had on Wednesday embarked on a warning strike following the failure of the government to implement an agreement reached between the two parties in 2009.
The Senate, at a plenary on Tuesday authorized it’s President to intervene and avert possible worsening of the situation.
However, at Monday’s meeting called by the Senate Committee on Tertiary Institutions and TETfund the two sides failed to agree on the issue of “earned allowance “for lecturers.
This forced the committee to adjourn the peace meeting indefinitely to allow for more consultations.
The meeting, chaired by Sen. Jibrin Barau (APC-Kano), was attended by the national leadership of ASUU led by its National President, Prof. Biodun Ogunyemi, the Executive Secretary of the National Universities Commission (NUC), Prof. Abubakar Rasheed; and the Director General of the National Pension Commission (PenCom), Mrs. Ahonu-Amazu, among others.
Briefing journalists after the meeting, Sen. Barau, who is chairman of the Committee said the meeting agreed on all issues at stake except the one on ‘earned allowance’.
However, ASUU president declined comment as the union’s delegation to the meeting quietly walked away without talking to journalists.
Strikes by ASUU and other bodies in the Nigerian educational sector has become an unending malady that defies all treatments. Successive governments have failed to address the root causes of the problems turning the country’s educational system and institutions into a laughing stock of the world.
