By Mahdi Waziri Isa
The Academic Staff Union of Universities has finalized preparations for a comprehensive industrial action, declaring that a two-week warning strike will commence imminently unless the Federal Government addresses their demands by October 13.
ASUU President, Chris Piwuna, confirmed the union’s resolved position during an address at the Orientation/Leadership Training hosted by the Niger Delta University Branch in Bayelsa State. He emphasized that the decision follows collapsed negotiations and unfulfilled government promises regarding the 2009 ASUU-FGN Agreement.
“The warning strike has been issued and we are not meeting to discuss that again as a union because our position has been taken,” Piwuna stated definitively. “By midnight of Monday, we will embark on a two-week warning strike, after which we will meet to decide when to begin an indefinite and comprehensive strike action.”
The union leader detailed years of frustrated negotiations, noting that the government had repeatedly failed to honor its commitments.
“We have given the government enough time on this particular issue; just imagine they gave us three weeks to get back to them and never did till this moment,” Piwuna recounted, stressing that the impending strike results from government inaction rather than union impulsiveness.
Piwuna also expressed strong reservations about the NELFUND student loan program, describing it as fundamentally flawed for Nigeria’s economic reality.
“We have told the government that we do not support loans in such a depressed economy,” he asserted, questioning how students would repay loans in a context of widespread unemployment and economic hardship.
The ASUU president raised additional concerns about the program’s financial management, revealing that “an organisation that is less than a year old and has less than a hundred staff is spending N14 billion on personnel, when even this university that has over 1,000 staff can’t spend that amount in a year.”
The gathering also featured addresses from other academic leaders, including ASUU National Financial Secretary Happiness Uduk, who emphasized maintaining integrity and accountability within the union, and Federal University of Petroleum Resources Vice Chancellor Ezekiel Agbalagba, who stressed the importance of adhering to ASUU’s founding principles.