Calls on Federal Government to Meet Lecturers’ Demands
Immediately
- Lecturers! Don't Sit At Home, For Mass Protest and Demonstrations
- Students! Support the Strike, Don't Break It!
- For a United Struggle of Education Workers and Students to Save Education From Collapse
Press
Statement
Arising
from its NEC meeting at the Olabisi Onabanjo University (OOU) over the weekend,
the Academic Staff Unions of Universities (ASUU) declared an indefinite strike
action. As always, the issue that has forced the union to declare a strike is
the Federal Government's persistent refusal to fully implement the FGN/ASUU
agreement signed since 2009.
The
Education Rights Campaign (ERC) fully backs the decision of ASUU to embark on
this strike. Recall that the ERC played a role in 2009 through protest actions
and demonstrations to get this agreement signed. We are therefore duty bound to
stand with ASUU and University lecturers in their current struggle to get the
agreement fully implemented. We call on the government to meet ASUU's demands
immediately.
As
the experience of the last three and half years has shown, it would take a far
more monumental struggle than the one needed to get the agreement signed to
force the corrupt capitalist government to actually implement it. This is why
as ASUU embarks on another strike, we have to reiterate that this strike should
not be taken as just a sit-at-home action. Instead it has to be taken as a mass
struggle to compel the government to commit Nigeria's resources to the funding
of education, provision of adequate teaching facilities and to meet the needs
of staffs in terms of pay and working conditions.
Ultimately
not one of the demands of ASUU can be satisfactorily implemented without a
turnaround in government's lackadaisical, negligent and anti-poor attitude to
education. Needless to say, only a government that is truly committed to using
Nigeria's resources to fund education can fully and satisfactorily guarantee
the pay and working conditions of staff. This is why in the current strike and
subsequent ones, the demands for improvement in education funding, democratic
management of schools and provision of free education at all levels have to be
fully placed on the front burner, not as secondary issues but as demands ASUU
would be willing to continue to fight for even if the agreement presently in
contention is implemented.
To
therefore make this strike as such a mass struggle as we have outlined above,
ASUU has to begin mobilisation of its members as well as students, youth and
the public for public mass actions like rallies, leafleting and demonstrations.
Evidently,
no reasonable person can blame University lecturers for again embarking on
strike. Since 2009, the Union has embarked on series of actions including
dialogues and occasional strikes none of which have succeeded in convincing the
government to meet its demands.
Above
all, the fact that ASUU strike is coming on the heels of several other
industrial actions already racking the education sector such as the strike
action of the National Union of Teachers (NUT) and particularly the nationwide
strike of the Academic Staff Union of Polytechnics (ASUP) and the Senior Staff
Association of Nigerian Polytechnics (SSANIP) which has lasted for more than 50
days now shows that there is nowhere else to lay the blame for the perennial
strike disrupting academic activities in the education sector except at the
doorsteps of the government.
However
as several unions in the education sector are putting forward the demands of
their members through strikes, it is very unfortunate that nothing is being
heard from the National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS). This gives the
wrong impression that perhaps students have no grievances or demands to put on
the table. Meanwhile students bear the brunt of government anti-poor policies
of education underfunding and commercialisation. Nearly 10 students have been
killed by the police this year alone during protests on campuses.
The
ERC believes students need to organise themselves and put forward their
grievances and demands on fee hike, underfunding, inadequate facilities, poor
municipal services and victimisation etc. We call on NANS to immediately
declare and begin to mobilise for a one-day nationwide lecture boycott and mass
protest as a way to put forward students demands and also to give active
solidarity support to the strike actions of ASUU, ASUP and SSANIP.
ASUU,
ASUP and SSANIP are fighting for generally the same thing - the welfare of
their members and the adequate funding of education. The fact that the three
unions are on strike at the same time and arguing the same issues shows there is
basis for unity. The ERC believes their strikes will be more powerful and
highly effective if linked together as a jointly coordinated strike movement to
fight for improvement in public education. To do this, the ERC calls on ASUU,
ASUP, SSANIP and also NANS to link up their struggles together by mobilising
for joint rallies, protest and mass demonstrations to secure a quick victory
Hassan
Taiwo Soweto
National
Coordinator
1 comment:
Like i said in 2009, ASUU demand is outrageous. I'd say, as an organ of intellectuals within the Nigerian system, the idea of the unprompted nation wild industrial action is to only take the advantage of the clueless leadership of the country. Fight between the 'Smarts' and the 'Intelligent' has always ended in favour of the smart. However, the strength of it number could have been annexed into achieving 'more' rather than actuated self-interest.
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