The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) has berated the federal government of claiming to have reached an agreement with it on virtually all the issues that necessitated the strike embarked upon since February.
Addressing newsmen on Tuesday in Awka, Anambra state, the Owerri Zonal Coordinator of the body, Comrade Uzo Onyebinama regretted the government’s deceitful disposition at the expense of the future of Nigerian students.
He said the body was not ready to call off the strike until all the agreements it had with the government were renegotiated and signed, despite its negative implications on its members.
He also called for the support of both students and parents to prevail on the federal government to do the needful to save the university education from total collapse.
He said, “We’ve resolved that until these issues are resolved, and being implemented, we’re not going to go back to class because it’s bothered on our salaries and other condition of service.
“Yes, our salaries have not been paid since February, they’ve managed to pay some till June, while some are being owed nine months, some three because of the confusion called IPPIS, we’re still willing to continue in the struggle.”
Describing the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS) as diversionary by the government to overshadow the issues at stake, Onyebinama insisted they would not be cowed by such distractions.
“We said we don’t want further Memorandum of Actions, we want implementations because we’ve had series of them without implementations which had led us to this merry go round of strikes.
“If they keep dilly-dallying, maybe other forces may take over the struggle from us. NANS has given an ultimatum for this strike to end so as to return to school, we don’t know their next line of action. But one thing we know is that the government doesn’t have all the time to implement these issues we raised,” he added.
The leadership of the body from Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu University, Federal University of Technology, Owerri, Imo State University, Owerri, Michael Okpara University of Agriculture, Umudike and Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka were present at the meeting.
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