Don’t Go On Strike Yet, Jakande Pleads With ASUU

Former governor of Lagos State and eminent journalist, Alhaji Lateef Jakande, on Thursday in Lagos urged the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) to reconsider its planned “action” against government, scheduled for June.

ASUU had on May 17, given notice of an impending “action” beginning from an unspecified date in June to compel the National Assembly to pass a Bill before it on the 2009 FG/ASUU agreement.

The agreement included an upward review of the retirement age of professors from 65 years to 70 years, upgrade of facilities and proper funding for research in the universities.

Jakande told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) that what the union was requesting for was not out of place, but that it should give President Goodluck Jonathan some time to look into the matter.

“I’d like to appeal to ASUU to give President Jonathan a chance. He is just coming in and I have no doubt in my mind that he will look seriously into their demands.

“I know that some of us, neither in ASUU nor government will do our very best to make sure that ASUU is not pushed to the point of having a national strike. It would be another tragedy.

“But I appeal to them to give the president a chance and I believe that he will honour the pledge of the previous governments.

On calls for the scrapping of the NYSC scheme, the octogenarian statesman said the scheme should be sustained.

“NYSC is a great scheme for the development of our youths. The wicked act that was performed in this last election is very disturbing, but I know that those who did it will get the punishment of God in His own way.

“Youth service corpers being killed is a heartless thing. Why should anybody kill the youth just because he is not happy with the election in the system?

“What we should do is to prevent similar incidents in the future. Scrapping the scheme would mean destroying our structure and depriving the Nigerian youth of development.

“What we should ensure in future is that we do not expose the corpers to such dangers. We should also strive to strengthen our security system.”

Ten NYSC members were killed in post-election violence in some states in the northern part of the country in April.