JGN Onyekpe
I have long stopped commenting on the utterly deplorable state of the public university system in dear Nigeria, the plight of the beleaguered dons, and the naked irresponsibility of the federal government, despicably manifested in its arrogant refusal to address the fundamental issues and problems.
ASUU suspended its 2022 eight-month strike in October of the same year in the hope that the government would be reasonable and positively address the problems of the public university system. But after a little less than three years, the government has remained characteristically insensitive, and, hence, the rot in the university system has continued to worsen.
We have waited and waited in vain for the tiny microscopic minority of ‘moderates’ and ‘patriots’ among us in ASUU and others outside ASUU preaching sermons on ALTERNATIVES TO STRIKE, to mention whatever ALTERNATIVES the Union has not explored.
It is incontestable that whatever ASUU has received from the government over the years has been through strikes.
About a year ago, ASUU branches nationwide voted in a referendum for the continuation of the eight-month national strike suspended in October 2022. But in its wisdom, the national leadership of the union magnanimously decided to give the federal government the benefit of the doubt, again, in the hope that the government would seize the opportunity of the grace of the ASUU leadership. It was not easy for the leadership to manage the situation as members everywhere had become restive and radicalised by the arrogance of the government and its failure to act in the interest of the public university system.
Members have today given up on the government. Let the accursed and thieving political elite in brazen control and manipulation of the prebendary comprador state continue to behave and act like the ostrich! We have given them enough time and space to adjust. They have made up their mind not to address the problems of the universities. Therefore, ASUU should respond appropriately.
As ASUU National Executive Council, NEC, meets in Sokoto this weekend, members of the Union expect that they will not return to their branches of the Union to preach the gospel of “Let us give the federal government a little more time”. If the government does not act positively while the meeting of NEC lasts, ASUU leadership should rise from their crucial meeting with a declaration of an immediate, indefinite strike. All that is needed is the reaffirmation and animation of the outcome of the last referendum that has been in abeyance. Branch leaders at the ongoing meeting of ASUU-NEC should reaffirm the result of the referendum for immediate execution.
Enough is now enough!
Comrade Nkem Onyekpe,
University of Lagos, Akoka, Lagos.
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