“Blame Minister Of Education And FG For The Continues Strike,” ASUU Tells Nigerians

The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) has urged Nigerians to hold the Federal Government and Minister of Education Adamu Adamu accountable for the protracted strike.

ASUU Zonal Coordinator for the Bauchi Zone, Prof. Lawan Abubakar, stated on Friday, August 26, at the University of Jos in Plateau State that Adamu had always supported ASUU’s protests and actions, including strikes before he became a minister because he always urged them to hold the government responsible.

He claimed that Adamu has suddenly turned on ASUU since taking over as minister of education and has been misleading other officials and the public about the union’s decisions.

The chairman reported Adamu as having said in 2013, “This nation owes a debt of gratitude to ASUU, and the strike should not be called off until the government accepts to do and does what is required. So, instead of hectoring ASUU to call off the strike, the nation should be praying for more of its kind in other sectors of the economy.”

The professor went on to say that Adamu Adamu recently claimed that, despite being a minister now, he still fully believed in everything he wrote about ASUU.

He said, “You may recall that when asked to make his comments on ASUU’s submission to President Buhari on Tuesday, the 9th of January, 2020, Adamu Adamu said he totally agreed with what ASUU presented, upon which note President Buhari handed him ASUU’s document and directed him to come up with a proposal for an amicable solution.

“For the same Adamu Adamu to now lead his colleagues, the other ministers, to misrepresent facts and mislead the good people of Nigeria against ASUU is rather unfortunate. It is the highest level of unpatriotic disservice a minister would do to his nation, particularly in a sector like education which is the backbone of the development of any country.

“If this is the way to end the ASUU strike, ASUU-Bauchi Zone is taking exception to it and assuring Adamu Adamu that he is wrong; he has rather succeeded in undermining the future of Nigerian youths and Nigeria. If it would take him six (6) months to only come up with this deceit as a solution to the strike, we then have the right to ask whether he really was serious with education or stage-managing it.

“It has now come to bear, that the minister had all along been deceiving everybody since 2017, as far as ASUU’s agitations in the tenure of this government are concerned. We want the general public to know that the Federal Government through Adamu Adamu did NOT approach ASUU with any reasonable and acceptable solutions to the issues in the contention that led to the current strike.”

Another minister who participated in the negotiations, according to Abubakar, was the Minister of Labor and Employment, Dr. Chris Ngige. He stated that Ngige allegedly ended the talks and launched a presidential campaign, spending N100 million to purchase a nomination form only to later withdraw and forfeiting the money.

He said, “We are now hearing stories of termites eating up documents related to the expenditure of over 17 billion Naira in NSITF (National Insurance Trust Fund), a parastatal in the Federal Ministry of Labor and Employment where Chris Ngige holds sway as minister. If Ngige would abandon talks with ASUU for his Dead-on-Arrival presidential bid, one would not expect the Minister of Education to do the worst to the Ministry of his charge.”