BREAKING: Once more, ASUU extends strike

After a sequence of heated discussions, the Tutorial Employees Union of Universities has determined to increase its ongoing strike, The PUNCH reliably learnt.

The choice was taken after the Nationwide Govt Council assembly on the union’s headquarters on the College of Abuja on Monday morning.

ASUU had declared the graduation of a strike on Monday, February 14, 2022, on the College of Lagos.

In the meantime, in an interview with The PUNCH, the spokesperson for the Federal Ministry of Schooling, Ben Goong, defined that the federal government had taken all potential steps to finish the strike.

He mentioned, “As regards the following steps, the federal government has already inaugurated a committee to harmonise the IPPIS, UTAS, and UP3. It will be sure that the federal government can pay with just one cost platform that can harmonise all of the technical peculiarities.

“Should you carry some calls for and virtually 80% have been attended to, there is no such thing as a want to tug the strike anymore.

“It’s unreasonable for the strike to be lingering seeing as the federal government has labored in direction of fulfilling many of the calls for.”

ASUU had faulted the federal government for failing to fulfill some lingering calls for which led to the suspension of its strike in 2020.

The union blamed the federal government for the failure to launch revitalization funds for universities, the failure to launch the white paper report of the visitation panel to universities, and failure to deploy the College Transparency Accountability System to pay salaries and allowances of lecturers.

Different calls for embrace renegotiating the ASUU-FG 2009 settlement and ending the proliferation of universities by state governments and lawmakers.

Talking with our correspondent in Abuja, a member of NEC who pleaded anonymity mentioned, “The strike has been prolonged, and the management has decentralized the communication channel. We’ve got obtained mandates to have interaction extra with the media and the general public to teach them on the struggles of ASUU”.

The strike by the union entered its 196th day right this moment (Monday).