End the ASUU strike now, avert bloodshed

The threat by Nigerian students to stage a nationwide protest if the Federal Government fails to address the demands of striking university lecturers should not be taken lightly by the Muhammadu Buhari administration but speedily resolved in order for members of the Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU to return to classroom, avert the impending showdown and possible loss of lives.

We demand that both parties to the industrial dispute should as a matter of national importance immediately cease hostilities, return to the negotiating table to seek a common ground for amicable resolution of all the contentious issues at stake in the interest of public universities’ students, their parents and a better future since the youths are the leaders of tomorrow.

The ASUU had embarked on a four-week warning strike on February 14 this year and on March 14 extended it by two months to allow the government meet all of demands. Again, the union declared a 12-week extension of the industrial action on May 9 despite the incalculable damage already wreaked on the universities, their students and the nation at large.

According to statistics, in the last two decades, the affected academics have gone on nationwide strikes for at least 16 times covering a cumulative period of more than 53 months over disputes relating to improved conditions of service, revitalization and upgrading of infrastructure in universities as well as autonomy for the institutions among others.

At the heart of their grievances that had resulted in disrupting public universities system over the years, is the 2009 ASUU/Federal Government agreement which provides for a periodic review after every three years.

In other words the document was ripe for the first review in 2012, secondly in 2015, 2018 and subsequently in 2021. Unfortunately, however, this was not to be as the immediate past administration of President Goodluck Jonathan didn’t implement the agreement before handing over to President Muhammadu Buhari in 2015. The issue remained unresolved but on the front burner before a Memorandum of Action was struck with the union in December 2020, after a nine -month strike by the lecturers.

According to ASUU, the renegotiation initially delayed by Dr Wale Babalakin, former chairman, Governing Council, University of Lagos and government’s representative at the time, was slated to have been concluded in 2018 but for the nonchalant attitude on the part of the incumbent administration. But hope that an amicable resolution was in sight brightened following Babalakin’s replacement by Prof. Munzali Jubril thus paving the way for a commencement of dialogue that was later concluded in May 2021.

We further note that a year after, the government is yet to sign and implement the renegotiated deal expected to have guaranteed industrial harmony in public ivory towers.

Another bone of contention between the warring parties is the controversial Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS) which the academics have stridently advocated that it be replaced with a homegrown alternative payroll system developed by them, the University Transparency and Accountability Solution (UTAS) on account of the former’s ‘deficiencies’ but which the government rejected on the ground that the latter had failed an integrity test conducted by the National Information Technology Development Agency, NITDA.

Significantly too, it should be recalled that the ruling All Progressives Congress, APC-led government citing low oil prices, had insisted that it lacked the needed funds to address the welfare and existential issues in our universities. For instance under the agreement for the revitalization and improvement of infrastructure in the institutions which ASUU is still fighting to be implemented, the sum of N472,031,575,919 was estimated to have been allocated in the 2009 budget; N497,531,778,701 (2010) and N548,768,190,681 in 2011 totaling N1.52 trillion during the first three years of its coming into force.

Similarly, according to the records, the Jonathan administration didn’t keep faith with the document until 2014 when it released only N200 billion for the purpose while the incumbent government has so far reportedly disbursed just a paltry N50 billion in 2020 as a sign of its commitment to honouring the earlier agreement, thus precipitating the protracted crisis that had engulfed universities in the country following the strike by ASUU.

We are deeply worried that education, acclaimed as an agent of development and described by former South Africa President late Nelson Mandela as the ‘most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world’ as well as the bedrock of any meaningful social, economic and technological advancement of any country continues to suffer undue neglect and poor funding by successive administrations despite the negative effects and enormous collateral damage inflicted on the affected tertiary institutions and the society at large through such carelessness.

And the reason often adduced for such criminal abandonment is the fact that most politicians and public office holders don’t send their wards to public universities but to foreign higher institutions. This must stop.

Like we argued in our recent editorial on the strike, Nigeria with an estimated 10.5million out-of -school children, the highest rate in the world as well as the poverty capital of the globe, cannot afford to keep most of her undergraduates at home indefinitely due to ongoing action by ASUU which is why no stone should be left unturned in raising the needed funds to quickly address the grievances of the academics.

Strike, an ill wind that blows no good had over the years resulted in such devastating consequences as disrupting varsity’s academic calendar, heightening craving for short cut to success by idle students who indulge in various criminality, lowering the quality of graduates that can’t compete with their peers from other countries, elongates duration of students on campuses, adversely affecting their job opportunities after graduation especially in the private sector which view them as half baked as well as loss of some of the nation’s promising best brains to other countries and denying local universities of foreign research grants.

Besides, past industrial actions on the part of lecturers had resulted in exodus of students abroad, devaluation of the naira as parents struggle for foreign exchange to pay the school fees and cater for other needs of their wards.

According to the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, educating children overseas cost the nation’s economy $28.65billion between 2010 and 2020 due to largely to poor quality education coupled with incessant strikes by lecturers in public universities. Similarly the trend dampened morale of both students and lecturers, triggered a loss of patronage from foreign students who wished to study in Nigeria, paralysed commercial activities on campuses and in extreme cases led to depression as students end up spending between seven and eight years for a four or five years course.

To checkmate further damage to the system, we strongly believe that no sacrifice would be too much on the part of government that had allocated about N4.6trillion to fuel subsidy alone, to bear in acceding to the demands of the lecturers considering the critical role of education in nation building and development.

And the government’s argument that it lacked the needed funds to fully implement the agreement should no longer be taken seriously going by the speed with which stalwarts of the ruling APC doled out over N2.5billion for nomination and expression of interest forms within a few days recently.

It is our strong view therefore that the Federal and State Governments should stop their lamentation over shortage of funds, think out of the box and take the bull by the horns to increasing budgetary allocation to the education sector to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, UNESCO benchmark of 15 to 20 percent of the annual appropriation and ensure judicious use of the Tertiary Education Trust Fund, TETFund to free more resources for public universities in the country.

In the unlikely event that allocations from both sources are inadequate, the government should muster the political will to effect minimal increase in tuition fees paid by students in the affected institutions for them to be properly funded and guarantee not only stable academic calendar but result in the production of quality graduates henceforth who can compete with the best worldwide and meaningfully contribute their quota to the nation’s overall development.

Apart from the possibility of loss of lives from any confrontation between security agencies and students during the threatened nationwide protests ordered by the National Association of Nigerian Students, NANS who are targeting all federal highways and roads leading to airports as well as forthcoming national presidential primaries of both the APC and the main opposition Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, an immediate peaceful resolution of the strike has therefore become not only imperative but in the national interest.

Above all, even though some of the universities’ students have commenced isolated peaceful protests in parts of the country by disrupting vehicular traffic on major federal expressways over the lingering strike, the government has a statutory responsibility not to allow the situation further degenerate by immediately inviting ASUU to the negotiating table for a final amicable settlement of the dispute to avert a looming danger posed by national protest planned by NANS.

For a better society