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The President of the Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU Abdullahi Sule – Kano said at a news conference in Abuja that suspension of the strike which becomes effective midnight on Sunday was due to positive signals from Government and appears by well meaning Nigerians.
According to him, the decision was taken after the National Executive Council of the Union at the University of Abuja. He said, the Universities are now free to resume normal academic activities.
But also very significant is Federal Government’s promise to recall 49 lecturers of the University of Ilorin (Unilorin) who were sacked in controversial circumstances in 2001 but whose recall was consistently opposed by former president, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo. Two of them have died in the process of fighting for their re-instatement.
Unilorin branch of ASUU had gone on strike in February 2001 which later progressed into the strike of April 2001 called by the national body. The then Vice-chancellor of the University, Prof. S. Oba Abdulraheem, ordered the lecturers back to work and opened an attendance register for them. Those who refused to resume were threatened with sack.
Some of the lecturers heeded the call of the school authorities while others remained adamant. In May 2001, the university made good its threat by terminating the appointment of 49 lecturers who refused to suspend their strike. The affected lecturers included 15 professors, two associate professors, 16 senior lecturers, 18 lecturers, 40 doctors and 12 lecturers in the medical school, 11 of whom were consultants.
While many were forgiven and recalled, the “Unilorin 49” was found not to be guilty by the Banjo Committee but the authorities refused to recall them. Some were also forcefully ejected from the Staff Quarters. Efforts by various groups and prominent individuals in the country to get the school authorities to recall the lecturers however failed.
The union, Sule-Kano said, considered the “firm signals” emanating from the Federal Government, especially the pledge by the government to reinstate the 49 lecturers of the Unilorin, sacked in violation of the non-victimisation clause in the 2001 Agreement, through the process of out-of-court settlement; to employ the principle of collective bargaining in resolving the industrial dispute and to address the rot and brain drain in the university system and establish internationally competitive standards.
The union leader noted that in the course of the intervention, the Federal Government not only expressed appreciation for the work of university scholars and the need to remove them from the civil service framework, especially as it relates to Pensions and Consolidation, but also pledged to tackle the funding crisis in the university system through increased budgetary allocations and exploitation of extra-budgetary sources of funding.
According to him, the strike was being suspended based on the firm assurances from the Presidency that no academic staff shall be victimised on account of his role in the current strike; that the re-negotiation process shall be completed speedily and that issues leading to the strike would be resolved in the interest of education and national development.
“We however want to express our fears that what could potentially be achieved and consolidated through this intervention in the overall interest of the nation can be undermined and jeopardized by bureaucracy and elements interested in keeping the Nigerian education down. It is our hope that all our colleagues will be reinstated to their jobs speedily so as to end seven years of needless suffering and that the renegotiation will be concluded quickly without recourse to another industrial action,” Sule-Kano said.
ASUU declared an indefinite strike on March 26, 2007 following what it described as the consistent neglect of the university system by the government. The union has been in the vanguard of the struggle for the restoration of the universities following a general decline in standards in the late 1970s occasioned by decay in infrastructure and exodus of its best brains overseas in search of green pasture.
The efforts to restore glory to the nation’s ivory towers culminated in the signing of the Joint Agreements of 1982, 1992, 1999 and 2001.
The agreements, which were products of collective bargaining, addressed the issues of salaries and conditions of service for the academic staff; funding of the universities, university autonomy and academic freedom.
The agreements also made provisions for a three-year periodic review but were often ignored by government each time they were due.
Before the current strike, ASUU and the Federal Government’s team had been involved in a cat-and-mouse game beginning from December 12, 2006, when the re-negotiation of the 2001 Agreement kicked off.
Although both teams agreed on the need to reverse the rot in the system and stem the tide of brain drain, government’s proposal did not go beyond the offer of consolidated salary package which it said was non-negotiable, a situation ASUU said was unacceptable and a negation of the cardinal principle of collective bargaining.
The reinstatement of “Unilorin 49” had been a subject of agitation by ASUU since 2001. In 2003, it embarked on strike to compel the Federal Government to order the school's authorities to recall the sacked lecturers but this was not achieved before the strike was called off as the school authorities and the Minister of Education remained adamant. The battle later shifted to the courts.
On July 26, 2005, the Federal High Court, Ilorin ruled in favour of the affected lecturers that the termination of the appointments on account of their participation in the strike without fair hearing was “illegal and unconstitutional”. Consequently, the court declared the termination of the appointments of the lecturers “null and void” and ordered their immediate reinstatement. The judgment was however challenged by the university.
ASUU again embarked on another strike early this year calling for their recall. Their demands were not met before the administration of President Olusegun Obasanjo ended in May. Last week, motions seeking for an end to the strike were moved on the floors of the Senate and the House of Representatives.
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