Academic Staff Union of Nigerian University, ASUU, Nsukka chapter has on Tuesday threatened to commence what they described as the “mother of All Strike” failure by the Federal Government to pay their withhold eight months' salary arrears that accumulated while they were on strike. UNN-ASUU chairman for Nsuka chapter, comrade Christian Opata, while addressing newsmen shortly before the union members embarked on a peaceful protest at the Nsukka main campus in Enugu state, hinted that the Institution will not hold any Senate or departmental Board meeting to approve student results.
Comrade Opata said, “ it raises a moral question,” for the Federal Government to renege on honouring agreements it signed with the members of the Union in 2009.
He also accused the federal government of tactically “unleashing anarchy on the nation,” when it adopted a no-work-no-pay-strategy while expecting the academicians to do all the arrears work that accumulated during the industrial action.
He threatened that those students will be affected by their actions in the universities will plunge the nation into anarchy.
Opata though admitted that the ASUU is not in any way at logger-head with the university management in their effort to seek redress from the Federal Government.
In his statement, “The bone of contention has been that we have a government that refused to honour an agreement it willingly signed. This raises moral questions because this is an agreement the government signed willingly through collective bargaining; yet, it refused to honour it since 2009.
He added, “To make matters worse, the same government which reneged on the agreement has turned to punish those it reached the agreement with and they held our children at home for eight months. We suspended the strike and the same government adopted pro-rata payment as if to say that we are labourers of casual work.
He explained, “We are still running the 2020/2021 academic session and students are being graduated, yet, the government is telling us no-work-no-pay. ASUU can accept that condition and decide not to graduate older students, except those admitted this year. Can government hold us culpable if we do this? Can they sustain the pressure which would be coming from students who may not be graduated? Would the government not be unleashing anarchy on the nation?
Opata revealed that ASUU has a lot of options at its disposal, only that it does not want to throw this nation into maximum anarchy.
Vigil360 learned that those who protested to the Vice Chancellor’s office at the UNN chapter were holding placards with varying inscription on them; ”We say no to bad governance, ASUU members live matter; pay us our salary backlogs; no pay, no 2020/2021 academic session results. We say no to pro-rata; our Government does not honour agreement; get ready for mother of all strikes,” among others.