House of Representatives Speaker Femi Gbajabiamila raises hope on end to Fed Govt/ASUU face-off yesterday raised hope that the ongoing strike by the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) would soon be over.
Gbajabiamila gave the hint after meeting behind closed doors with ASUU leadership and Minister of State for Education Goodluck Oppiah in Abuja.
Before the closed-door session, the Speaker urged the Federal Government and ASUU to make concessions on the contentious issues that have prolonged the strike.
Earned Academic Allowances of lecturers; non-renegotiation of a 2009 agreement and government’s refusal to deploy the University Transparency and Accountability Solution (UTAS) as a platform for payment of ASUU members’ wages.
The government had on September 8 dragged ASUU to the National Industrial Court (NiC), Abuja, over the strike, which began on February 14.
In the suit, government asked the court to direct the union members to return to the classrooms. It also asked NiC to determine whether it was right or wrong for ASUU to insist on payment of its members’ salaries for the period they have been off duty.
ASUU counsel, Femi Falana (SAN), has, however, asked government to withdraw the matter, which comes up for ruling today.
After his meeting with the ASUU team, led by Prof. Emmanuel Osodeke, and Minister Oppiah, the Speaker said the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA); Accountant-General of the Federation, Aghughu Arhotomhenla; Acting Auditor–General of the Federation Sylva Okolieaboh and the National Salaries Incomes and Wages Commission would appear before the House tomorrow over the matter.
He said: “We have been here for hours now, deliberating on issues regarding the ongoing ASUU strike. We have covered good ground. Let me just put it that way we have made very good progress.
“As I said earlier, ours is to interface directly with ASUU as an independent arm of government to find out exactly the details and how solutions can be offered like they said two heads are better than one.
“Now that the legislature has come in, we are very hopeful based on our deliberations in the last four or five hours that there is light at the end of the tunnel. So, I thank them once again for making this time out in the interest of our students.
“There are principally seven areas where ASUU has presented what we consider to be the requisitions for them to go back to class. We have looked at those areas and we have more or less agreed on certain things.
“We have asked that NITDA, Accountant-General and Auditor General, and the Wages and Salaries Commission would be invited. Unfortunately, it’s too late to invite them tomorrow (today) because the letters can only go out tomorrow. They will be invited to meet with the leadership on Thursday so that we can dot the “I”s and cross the “T”s.
“Once that is done, the leadership of this House will await the return of Mr. President (Muhammadu Buhari) from the ongoing United Nations General Assembly and we will meet him and lay before him the agreement made by this arm of government.
“We are hopeful and believe that Mr. President will buy into the agreement and with that, I believe this matter will be speedily brought to a close.
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