The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) has revealed that the Federal Government has not paid its university lecturer's salaries since February it embarked on strike. This was disclosed through its president, Professor Emmanuel Osodeke on 2nd August during an interview with Channels Television's Sunrise Daily. Consequently, Osodeke accused the government of using hunger as a bargaining tool to get striking members back to work hence salaries not being paid for the past six months. Noting that the force of hunger cannot take the lecturer back to the classroom.
According to Osodeke, Government thinks that depriving the lecturers of their wages will coerce the university teachers to collapse and end the strike.“Our salaries have been held, this is the sixth month our salaries have been held. They thought that if they hold our salaries for two or three months we will come begging and say, ‘please allow us to go back to work. “But we as a union of intellectuals, we have grown beyond that. You can’t use the force of hunger to pull our members back, which is exactly what the Government is doing,” Osodeke said.
Recall that ASUU embarked on this industrial action on 14th February in the quest to drive home its demand for a better welfare package, and revamping the nation's education sector, among others. Reacting to the persisting industrial dispute between ASUU and the FG, President Muhammadu Buhari on 19th July, instructed the Minister of Education, Adamu Adamu, to proffer a solution to the lingering issue and get back to him in two weeks.
Today is the deadline for the presidential ultimatum, and ASUU vowed not to relent until its demands are satisfied.
The union, unperturbed by the event, decided to extend the strike for an additional four weeks, dashed students’ dreams of returning to class.
