The Michael Okpara University of Agriculture, Umudike branch of Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) has said the federal government’s continued silence over their plight is “unhealthy and worrisome”.
Chairman of the branch, Michael Ugwuene, stated this while addressing a rally and press conference organised by the branch at the university campus yesterday.
Ugwuene said the union had over the years been struggling and contending with the government over implementation of an agreement they signed in 2009 through dialogue and strikes, all to no avail.
“The agreement,” he said, “has four major components: conditions of service, funding, university autonomy and academic freedom and other matters related to regulations, working environment, etc.”
He said the issues comprise the government’s refusal to implement reports of renegotiated agreements, gross inadequate funding of universities and nonchalant/insensitivity towards the members.
Others are withholding of their salaries, earned academic allowance, violation of university autonomy, the introduction of IPPIS, illegal dissolution of governing councils, imposition of CCMAS, and proliferation of public and private universities.
He said the union had been struggling over the years to ensure that the federal and state governments fund the universities and properly renumerate the workers to ensure their survival.
The chairman maintained that such interventions would go a long way to prevent the total collapse of the universities and reduce the exit of the lecturers, known as the “Japa” syndrome to look for greener pastures abroad.
“We hereby call on President Bola Tinubu to rise up to the occasion and address the lingering issues for which we have struggled over the years to attract the governments’ attention,” he stated.
According to Ugwuene, the essence of their struggle is to make universities in the country take an enviable place among other universities in the world.
The members who turned up in large numbers, carrying placards with different inscriptions to express their grief and marched peacefully from their secretariat to the university gate.
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