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By Fatima Mukhtar
The Federal Government has declared that the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) has no justification for embarking on a strike, insisting that all the union’s demands have been fully addressed.
Minister of Education, Prof. Tahir Mamman, made the statement on Monday while reacting to the two-week warning strike announced by ASUU earlier in the day. He said the government had met every request presented by the union through several meetings and negotiations.
According to him, “We have met all the major demands put forward by ASUU. Therefore, there is no reason whatsoever for another strike action that will further disrupt the academic calendar and affect Nigerian students.”
Mamman urged the union to return to dialogue rather than resorting to industrial action, noting that President Bola Tinubu’s administration remains committed to improving the welfare of university lecturers and revitalising the education sector.
However, ASUU has refuted the government’s claims, insisting that many of its longstanding demands remain unresolved. The union cited the non-implementation of the 2009 FG-ASUU agreement, unpaid arrears of salaries, revitalisation funds for public universities, and the issue of victimisation of some of its members.
According to Punch, the union maintained that the two-week warning strike was necessary to compel the government to fulfil its promises.
ASUU’s latest industrial action comes barely two years after its last major strike, which lasted for eight months and crippled academic activities across public universities in Nigeria.
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