Students Groan As ASUU Strike Paralyses Academic Activities

Students of various public universities in Nigeria have continued to groan over the indefinite strike action embarked upon by the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), on Monday. The action is in further protest of Federal Government’s refusal to implement the protracted FGN/ASUU agreement of 2009.

The union is asking the government, among other things, to improve university’s funding, review the process of appointing vice-chancellors and also review the retirement of lecturers to 70 years.

ASUU, under the auspices of its National Executive Council (NEC), had given government a two-month ultimatum to address the issues before embarking on the strike.

In the wake of this, students of the University of Lagos (UNILAG), Lagos State University (LASU) and Ambrose Ali University, Ekpoma as well as their counterparts nationwide, have expressed disappointment over the action.

The students made their grievances known that whenever government is at loggerheads with ASUU, they are always at the receiving end because the action prolongs their academic calendar unnecessarily.

“From my own perspective, it takes government nothing to implement the agreement it signed with ASUU two years ago. For crying out loud, if government knows it cannot fulfil the demands, why did it sign the agreement in the first place? This is just a confirmation that we don’t have a government that values education,” Tunde Osunkeye, a student of LASU said.

The reactions and expressions of other students in various institutions are no different. Abigail Ojemen, a student of Ambrose Ali University, Ekpoma, told Campus Square that “I don’t know how our leaders see this, but I think the recurrent industrial actions in the education sector are things of national disgrace. It is a pity.”

Jide, a student of UNILAG opined that politicians in Nigeria should be compelled to send their wards to public universities in Nigeria as part of the criteria for electing/appointing them into office.

“If we achieve this, you will realise that government will take our education system more serious. Their nonchalant attitude is simply because their wards study in the best universities abroad, so they don’t care what happens to poor citizens like us here,” Jide said.