Several lecturers, who were dressed in academic regalia, paraded around the campus while singing anti-government songs and carrying banners. ASUU tells FG: Academics can’t be casualized, educating is not a casual endeavor, Buhari stop Ngige from jeopardizing the future of Nigerian students, and Hold anti-poor Buhari accountable for squandered 8 months are some of the inscriptions on their banners.
ASUU members from the Federal University of Agriculture, Abeokuta (FUNAAB) on Wednesday held a nonviolent demonstration to against federal government’s casualization of university professors and the payment of half salaries to university lecturers.
Adeleye referred to the casualization of university professors as a modern-day slave trade and the worst thing that has ever happened to Nigeria’s educational system. He charged that the federal government was using the judiciary as a tool to punish union members even further.
The Chairman of ASUU, FUNAAB chapter, Dr. Oluwagbemiga Adeleye, previously addressed the congress and urged members of the union to resist injustice being meted out to them without becoming divided or deterred by the antics of the government.
The judiciary is currently being exploited to cause the average person additional suffering; it is no more the ordinary man’s last hope. In order to get our needs heard, we now more than ever need to work together. All of the union’s branches throughout Nigeria were instructed to hold this congress & protest rally by the union’s leadership.
Adeleye called the administration of President Muhammadu Buhari “deaf and dump” for failing to put education first and for not taking the wellbeing of professors seriously. The casualization of university employees, he claimed, was the most humiliating development in Nigerian academics; it was never this terrible.
The Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) has threatened to call a 3-day caution protest if the federal government does not resolve the casualization of professors, according to Prof. Olusiji Sowande, the national treasurer of ASUU. He attributed the ongoing conflict among ASUU and the federal government to the insensitivity of Dr. Chris Ngige, the minister of labor.
Professor Ighodalo Eromosele, the previous ASSU Chairman, stated that the 8 months of unpaid salaries may have an impact on promotions for time in rank, service loss, and broken service. He continued by saying that Chris Ngige, the minister of labor and employment, is acting out the President’s and Finance Minister’s script.
John Nikolas, the coordinator of the Campaign for Democratic and Workers Rights (CDWR), encouraged the Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC) to declare a 48-hour caution protest in favor of the objectives of ASUU. He claimed that Ngige devalued and demystified academia. Additionally, it betrays a blatant lack of understanding of an academic’s work schedule and contradicts the union’s demand that it return to the school.
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