National Telescope national telescope newspaper
By Daniel Ayantoye
The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), Ibadan Zone, has called on Nigerians to prevail upon issues between the Union and the Federal government which led to the ongoing two weeks warning Strike.
The Union made the call in a statement made available to CAMPUS FOCUS today; jointly signed by the Zonal Coordinator, Comrade Ade Adejumo and ASUU Chairpersons under the Zone which includes, University of Ilorin-Comrade Moyosore Ajao, University of Ibadan-Comrade Ayo Akinwole, Ladoke Akintola University of Technology-Comrade Biodun Olaniran, University of Osun-Comrade Femi Abanikanda and Kwara State University-Comrade Dauda Adesola.
According to the Statement, the union, said Nigerians shoudn’t blame ASUU when University System in the country is thrown into another crisis over government’s resfusal to address it’s concerns.
“the ongoing two weeks warning strike is a clarion call to Nigerians to prevail on the government to address all this concerns being raised by ASUU before the university system is thrown into another round of crisis. If the government refuses to heed this warning and the warning strike snowballs into a bigger and prolonged action, the nation should not blame ASUU.
Speaking on some of the demands of the Union, the statement explained that government has refused to implement it agreement reached upon in 2009 and 2012 which focused on infrastructure aswell as other issues facing Nigerian universities.
“Patriots, you will recall in 2012, due to the patriotic concern and struggle of ASUU about the embarrassing decay of infrastructural facilities in the Nigerian public universities, the Nigerian government announced to the nation, it’s commitment to meeting the needs on our universities. This commitment led to the establishment of NEEDS Assessment and Revatalisation Fund in 2012.
“However as is characteristic of this government, it has reneged on this promise almost a decade ago. As a responsible Union ASUU cannot keep quite while the condition under which our students are learning keep deteriorating at an alarming rate.
Speaking further on the government decision to use the Integrated Payroll and Personel Information System, IPPIS platform for payment of Lectures, ASUU said is offering the federal government to make use of the University Transparency and Accountability System, UTAS platform which comes free as opposed the IPPIS platform which requires the government to spend millions from the nation’s account.
“As an alternative, our union has preferred a more workable platform, UTAS, which will be domesticated in each university. The interesting thing about our own platform is that, while the government is paying millions to developers of IPPIS platform, ASUU is offering its solution to the government free of charge!”
