Academic activities in universities might once more come to a standstill as ASUU has threatened to embark on another strike action. The union’s president, Prof Emmanuel Osodeke, on Sunday, said that the looming strike is due to the government’s failure to implement the agreements made between both parties before the previous strike which lasted 9 months was suspended in December, 2020.
In March 2020, ASUU withdrew from academic activities, expressing its dissatisfaction with the level of funding of universities and the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS) which was deemed to be unfavorable to the lecturers. However, series of meetings were later held which produced a signed agreement between both parties, having come to a common ground.
According to Prof. Osodeke, another agreement was signed in May and since that time, unfortunately, none of these agreements have been implemented. He also added that the Federal Government has turned deaf ears to their cries . Hence, an ultimatum lasting till Tuesday has been given to the Federal Government to fulfill its promises, after which a full blown strike would commence if nothing positive is done.
Ever since brownites were welcome into ABH from the very long break due to the pandemic, it’s been no one’s prayer that anything interrupts the smooth running the rest of the academic activities again. However, the chances for the contrary keep getting higher as several factors keep contending seriously with this.
The ABH COVID-19 Task Force is working assiduously to keep the spread of the disease in check within the hall, preventing it from escalating into students having to be sent back home. Also, the clinical side of academic work is wobbling already by virtue of the resident doctors’ strike which has been on for about 4 weeks. There seems to be no end in sight yet.
As it stands now, physical classes are being restricted due to the rise in the number of COVID-19 cases among students and lecturers have adopted the virtual mode for some of their classes. But what happens when the lecturers decide to stop all academic activities? There might be a black cloud collapse of school activities. And students might have to vacate ABH again, having barely spent three months in the hall.
