Varsity Councils: CSO Tackles ASUU, Says Body Running Against Tide

A civil society organisation under the auspices of Forum for Good Governance (FGG) has accused the Academic Staff Union of the Universities (ASUU) of becoming a clog in the wheel of national development and progress in the education sector.

The organisation in a statement signed by its head of Policy and Strategy, Osondu Emeka, in Abuja, also said that it was confusing for ASUU to say that dissolving governing councils of public universities was a setback.

According to the CSO, the Union needed to explain to Nigerians why it was a setback because the statement indicated that ASUU was running against public opinion.

“It is very confusing because other concerned stakeholders have applauded President Bola Tinubu for the courage he has displayed in taking certain far-reaching decisions meant to rejig a number of the country’s vital institutions, including tertiary institutions whose Councils he dissolved, except ASUU which sees and has a different agenda.

“It is obvious ASUU is one of the groups working as a clog in the nation’s wheel of development and progress in the education sector. ASUU needs to explain why,” he said.

The group wondered why ASUU has not identified the ineptitude and corrupt tendencies displayed by members of some of the councils as a setback but instead pointed at correctional decisions as a setback.

“The contradiction is a sign that ASUU has always been deceiving Nigerians as it claims to be a voice for the underprivileged. A lot of the unsettling crisis in public tertiary institutions may have emanated from decisions taken by some of the governing councils backed by ASUU.

“As a body of intellectuals should ASUU not have surveyed the values most of the Councils added or projects they attracted to their institutions in the phase of economic hardship,” he stated.

Emeka further said that such findings would have buttressed their unguarded claim of the unjust dissolution of the Councils, “yet ASUU did not point at them as setbacks, but instead accused President Tinubu of taking steps to correct them as a setback.

“Something must be wrong somewhere and we demand that ASUU tells Nigerians what they are hiding.”

He added that the President’s decision was in line with extant constitutional provisions which give him the authority to dissolve the councils, that President Tinubu did not act out of order, citing section 2A, subsection 1 of schedule 3.

“Section 2A, subsection 1 gives the President the authority to dissolve the councils. That he rightly exercised his authority, could that be ASUU’s setback?” the group stated.