The ASUU president described the Minister of Labour, Dr. Chris Ngige, as a jester over his alleged efforts at proscribing the union.

Osodeke spoke while delivering his goodwill message at a special commemorative programme organised on Thursday by the ASUU chapter of the Olabisi Onabanjo University, Ago Iwoye, in Ogun State.

The event was held to honour the immediate past Vice Chancellor of the institution, Professor Ganiyu Olatunde, whose tenure ended two weeks ago and was succeeded by a cancer pathologist, Prof. Deji Agboola.

Osodeke berated the federal government for always being envious of ASUU’s achievements at setting qualitative and enduring standards in infrastructural provisions and services.

“I can see why Ngige is interested in banning ASUU because once ASUU is proscribed, all the union’s assets automatically becomes the federal government’s property,” he said.

The president added, “You will never succeed in banning ASUU because ours is a union that assesses the system and aligns with the worthy course, without being biased, for the progress of the Nigerian educational society.

One thing we have gotten wrong is that in the universities, we look at the VCs as Chief Executive Officers, which by the law, it is not true. A Vice-Chancellor is just one among equals, and it’s only when he sees himself as one that he will not have a problem with ASUU.”

While commending the former Vice Chancellor, ASUU National President said the union was impressed with Professor Olatunde for achieving a “most peaceful” administration during his tenure.

“Having assessed Professor Olatunde and found him worthy, the union was glad to associate with him to the extent that we have to suspend every other official engagements of the union to celebrate him. It is a pride for us to have a Vice Chancellor whom ASUU believed deserved to be honoured,” Osodeke said.

Earlier in his address, the Chairman of ASUU, OOU chapter, Dr. Joel Okewale, lauded the immediate past Vice-Chancellor for manifesting the spirit of comradeship while his tenure lasted.

Okewale said that the spirit of comradeship and willingness of Prof. Olatunde to engage, as opposed to bossing over everyone, led to many fruitful discussions, acceptance, and implementation of proposals in the interest of OOU.

However, the union in a press statement noted that the issues in its disputes with the Federal Government were not well addressed.

The press release, which was signed by the National President of the union, Professor Emmanuel Osodeke, however, hailed the intervention of the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Femi Gbajabiamila.

The statement partly read, “ The National Executive Council of ASUU held an emergency meeting at the Comrade Festus Iyayi National Secretariat, University of Abuja, Abuja, on Thursday, October 13, 2022”.

The union in its statement further noted that the Minister of Labour, Employment and Productivity, Chris Ngige, took the striking lecturers to court.

“The National Industrial Court, in its wisdom, gave an order compelling ASUU to resume work pending the determination of the substantive suit. Given the nature of the order, and in the opinion of our counsel, there was the need to appeal the interlocutory injunction granted against our union at the Court of Appeal.

“The Court of Appeal acknowledged the validity of the grounds of the union’s appeal but still upheld the order of the lower court and ordered our union to comply with the ruling of the lower court as condition precedent for the appeal to be heard.

“NEC noted the series of meetings with the leadership of the House of Representatives led by the Hon. Speaker, Rt. Hon. Femi Gbajabiamila, as well as intervention efforts of other well-meaning Nigerians both within and outside the government and the progress made so far.”

Speaking further on the status of negotiations, the union said, “While appreciating the commendable efforts of the leadership of the House of Representatives and other patriotic Nigerians who waded into the matter, NEC noted with regrets that the issues in dispute were yet to be satisfactorily addressed.

“However, as a law-abiding union and in deference to appeals by President Buhari and in recognition of the efforts of Hon. Gbajabiamila, and other well-meaning Nigerians, ASUU NEC resolved to suspend the strike action embarked upon on February 14, 2022. Consequently, all members of ASUU are hereby directed to resume all services hitherto withdrawn with effect from 12:01 on Friday, October 14, 2022.”

This is as the four week warning total and comprehensive strike embarked upon by the union enters its third week on Monday.

The spokesperson of the Ministry of Labour and Employment, Charles Akpan, made this known to our correspondent in Abuja on Saturday.

ASUU and the Federal Government had begun series of negotiations aimed towards the suspension of the recently declared total and rolling four-week strike declared by the union.

ASUU during its extra-ordinary National Executive Council meeting held at the University of Lagos on February 14, 2022 had declared a four-week comprehensive strike over what it claimed was the failure of the government to meet its demands.

The president of the union, Professor Emmanuel Osodeke, had insisted that the union would transform the strike to an indefinite strike if the government failed to honour its demands among which it listed as the release of earned allowances, release of revitalisation funds for universities, increase in salary scale of lecturers, deployment of the UTAS payment platform for university workers among others.

Recall that in March 2020, ASUU embarked on a strike following its disagreement with the FG over the funding of the universities and the ineffectiveness and discrepancies around the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System and others.

ASUU, however, developed the University Transparency and Accountability Solution to replace IPPIS and had several meetings with the Ministries of Finance, Education, Labour and Employment, and the Office of the Accountant General of the Federation before it was approved but yet to be implemented. Likewise, the FG and ASUU signed an agreement aimed at resolving some of the demands of ASUU, a development that led to the suspension of the strike on December 24, 2020.

In addition, after a meeting with the FG on August 2, 2021, Osodeke said the Nigeria Information Technology Development Agency insisted that UTAS must be re-presented to the end users. Also, at the meeting, Minister of Labour and Employment, Chris Ngige, assured ASUU that the N22bn earned allowance captured in the 2021 supplementary budget would soon be accessed by university workers.

The President of the Union, Professor Emmanuel Osodeke, in an interview with Punch, said the Federal government has failed to fulfill its own end of the agreement and that the Federal government delegation has since stopped answering all telephone calls made to them.

Osodeke said the union is giving the government till Tuesday, August 31, to reach out or it will activate the procedure of embarking on strike.

He said “The government has refused to reach out to us. Government officials have stopped. In fact, they don’t take our calls again. Nigerians should tell the government to do what they agreed to do. We signed an agreement and even in May, we reached a final agreement; this is August and nothing has been implemented. Does it make any sense? We are giving them till the end of August and after that, we start the procedures.”