As lovers readied their plans for merriment to mark Saint Valentine’s Day on February 14, 2022, the Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU, announced the commencement of strike.
The strike, which started off as a rollover strike, has since transited to an indefinite, total, and comprehensive strike.
Although stikes are not new to the Nigerian education sector, their duration and consistency give cause for worry. Barely do you meet a graduate from a public university in Nigeria who did not experience an ASUU strike before graduation. Prior to the ongoing strike, students were forced to spend nine months at home in 2020 due to a strike that was suspended after the President Muhammadu Buhari administration committed to addressing the demands of the union.
Consequently, to tackle one of the mainstream issues raised by ASUU, government set up a committee headed by Prof. Munzali Jubril to negotiate with ASUU on a new salary scale for academics in the nation’s universities. While the constitution of the committee may have seemed like an act in good faith, a few months down the line, after the committee completed its collective bargaining with the union, the federal government failed to implement the agreements reached.
Instead, a new committee was set up. The constitution of the new committee was not done until the union embarked on the ongoing strike. The Nimi Briggs committee was inaugurated in March to negotiate and come up with a new proposal on a salary structure. The Briggs committee, in collaboration with the ASUU leadership and other relevant agencies of government, engaged in a new round of negotiations.
In June, there was excitement in the public sphere as there were hopes of an end in sight when the committee concluded its task and came up with a draft agreement. The agreement was to be assented to by the federal government and the union.
However, all hope was dashed when the Minister of Labour and Employment, Chris Ngige publicly criticized the committee for arriving at what he described as a 109-185 percent increase in the salary of academics.
Ngige added that ASUU leadership insisted that critical federal government ministries and agencies such as the Ministry of Finance, Ministry of Education, Ministry of Labour and Employment, Budget Office of the Federation, National Salaries Income and Wages Commission, and Office of Head of Service of the Federation recuse themselves from the sitting of the committee. This claim was refuted by the Briggs committee in a statement. They insisted that the team imbibed strict adherence to best practices while discharging its duty.
Unlike in recent strikes when ASUU had several demands, the union appears to be prioritizing the review of their welfare package and the deployment of the locally developed University Transparency and Accountability Solution, UTAS, as a payment platform. The union faulted the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System, IPPIS, for its inconsistencies and for not fitting the peculiarities of the university system.
The claim does not seem to be far off the margin as the Minister of Communication and Digital Economy, Isa Pantami, had once acceded to a fault in the deployment of IPPIS, Government Integrated Financial Management Information System, GIFMIS, and the Treasury Single Account, TSA. Pantami stated that their deployment did not follow standard procedure. He had said, “At the time they were deployed, the provision of NITDA Act under section A, of setting the standardization of ICT deployment in federal public institutions was not followed.
“Because of this, these three systems were not subjected to government certification and IT project clearance as encouraged by law and many other government policies.”
Similarly, the Minister of Education, Adamu Adamu had said that although the government was yet to decide on which payment platform to deploy, preliminary reports proved that IPPIS and the Universities Peculiar Personnel Payroll System, UPPPS, developed by non-academic staff, ranked above IPPIS. One then wonders why the government appears to be holding on to a platform that its shortcomings have been acknowledged in the public domain by its custodians.
The corruption that has been perpetrated by public officials that man IPPIS is common knowledge. The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, is probing the suspended Accountant General of the Federation, AGF, Ahmed Idris, over financial crimes amounting to over 100 billion naira. Idris was charged with stealing and criminal breach of trust. If the AGF, being the chief custodian of IPPIS, could be facing corruption charges, it raises some questions about the system.
Apart from the porosity of IPPIS, ASUU has expressed reservations that the system does not give provisions for lecturers on sabbaticals and on adjunct duty. These are means through which universities cross-bread, cross-fertilize ideas, and make up for areas where a particular university might be short-staffed.
See Also: ASUU Decides Next Line Of Action After Court Order
While these issues are still on the front burner, the federal government filed a suit at the National Industrial Court, seeking an order from the court to compel ASUU to suspend the strike.
The court, in its ruling on Wednesday, September 21, 2022, granted the plea of the federal government and asked the lecturers to return to the classroom, pending the determination of the substantive suit.
One may then begin to ponder the feasibility of resolving an industrial dispute through court action. If one forces a horse to the stream, how possible will it be to force the horse to drink water? If lecturers are ordered to suspend strike, will they also be forced to teach students, set exams, and mark scripts?
While the court may serve as a good resort for other kinds of disputes, labour disputes do not appear suitable for such a strategy.
With ASUU’s decision to appeal the judgment and seek a stay of execution, it is certain that a protracted legal battle has just begun.
It is pertinent that the government of the day adopts a more civil approach through dialogue and seeks a lasting solution to the strike.
The leadership of the House of Representatives initiated a dialogue that should be explored and encouraged as a panacea to the impasse between ASUU and its employers. As the House continues its effort through an engagement with relevant stakeholders such as the Head of Service, National Salaries, Incomes and Wages Commission, NSIWC, National Information Technology Development Agency, NITDA, and the Accountant-General of the Federation, it is hoped that there will be light at the end of the tunnel.
In all of these, students bear the brunt of the fight between elephants. Most students are left disillusioned, perplexed, and in limbo about what their future holds. Nigerian students, especially children of middle-class citizens who cannot afford the exorbitant tuition of private universities or the cost of travelling abroad, are the most affected. While the strike lasts, politicians are proudly posting pictures of their kids who graduated from ivory foreign universities, where high tuition was paid with tax payers’ money. This speaks volumes about the kind of leaders Nigeria is ‘blessed’ with.
The Buhari administration must, as a matter of urgency, upscale its effort to address the contending issues that have kept the strike lingering for this long. It is no surprise that the President has not deemed it necessary to personally dialogue with ASUU as was the case with a former President, since he was never opportune to attain a university education. However, one would expect that he would delegate his vice, who is a professor and a product of the university system, to arrest this ugly situation. The President must take decisive and strategic actions to end this strike. Nigerians have heard enough from the presidency and political appointees. It is high time the President is heard.
Nigerian students deserve better, and leaders who have been voted into positions of authority must act decisively in the interest of the masses. Engaging in a legal tussle does not appear to be the master stroke that is needed to bring an end to the strike.
As we approach the commencement of political campaigns, one might wonder the scorecard of the ruling party when the nation’s best human resources are denied their right to education.
Nigeria must truly belong to everyone. Our educational sector must be made globally competitive and attractive to the best brains.
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