ASUU and FG resume talk over 2009 agreement

Speaking to Newsmen, on Wednesday, March 27, 2019, in Abuja, after a meeting that lasted six hours, the Chairman, Federal Government re-negotiation team, Dr. Wale Babalakin said he was hopeful that the renewed re-negotiations would yield positive result.

According to Punch, Babalakin said that ASUU had presented more than 20 issues that were being looked into to ensure stability in the Nigerian university system.

He added that both government and the union were determined to put an end to the lingering problems in the system.

He said, “We resumed our renegotiation today. The government team and ASUU were appropriately represented and we had positive discussions.

“We are actually hopeful that we are on a positive path to finalising the negotiation.

“There were very hectic discussions on topical issues and both sides had extensive contributions for the benefit of the university system.

“It is the same negotiation, we had interim discussion, that is over now and we are back to where we left off. So it is a continuous negotiation.

“ASUU submitted its timetable today and there are more than 20 issues in that timetable, it is not a single issue, but they will all be discussed.’’

Also, the National President of the Academic Staff Union of the University (ASUU) Prof Biodun Ogunyemi has spoken about the union’s renewed negotiation with the federal government.

Speaking to Premium Times after the meeting with the FG, Ogunyemi expressed hope that the process would not be truncated as it happened before.

He said, “We resumed the suspended renegotiation of the 2009 with the federal government team today. We’ve started from where we stopped in May 2018. We hope the process would not be truncated as it happened before.”

The Federal government promises and ASUU demands have over the years been the main reasons Nigerian Universities get shuttered.

The last ASUU strike lasted three months. It was declared on Sunday, November 4, 2018 and the union’s National Executive Meeting at the University of Technology, Akure and was suspended on Thursday, February 7, 2019, after a series of meeting between the union leaders and government representatives.