Politics
Nigerian govt expects ASUU to end strike in few days
The Minister of Labour and Employment, Chris Ngige, said on Wednesday the ongoing strike by the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) would end soon.
The minister stated this during a chat with journalists at the end of a conciliation meeting between the government and the union in Abuja.
Ngige said the meeting agreed on many issues and a timeline was scheduled for the implementation of the agreements.
He added that ASUU officials agreed to return to their members with offers made by government and revert to him before the week runs out.
The minister noted that many of the items in the 2020 Memorandum of Action (MOA) had been dealt with exhaustively, while some were being addressed.
ASUU embarked on a 30-warning strike on February 14 over the Federal Government’s failure to honour previous agreements signed by both parties.
He said: “We have only one or two areas that are new. One of the new areas is the renegotiation of the Conditions of Service, which is called the `2009 Agreement’.
“An agreement was reached in 2009 that their Conditions of Service would be reviewed every five years. It was done in 2014.
READ ALSO: ASUU warning strike a breach of labour laws – Ngige
“We started one in which the former UNILAG Pro- Chancellor, Wale Babalakin (SAN), was chairing the committee.
“After Babalakin, Prof. Manzali was in charge and the committee came up with a draft document proposed by the Federal Ministry of Education and ASUU.
“Today, Manzali’s committee has become defunct because many of the people in the committee are no longer pro-chancellors.”
He said a new team had been constituted to take a second look at that document.
Ngige added: “This is to make sure that some of the allowances are not against the National Salaries, Incomes and Wages Commission (NSIWC) fixed rates for wages and allowances.
“If you propose allowances that do not comply with NSIWC rates, the government will not be able accept it.
“So, it is important that they do the right thing from the beginning so that whatever the committee presents can be approved by the Federal Executive Council.”
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