Strike: ASUU meeting with FG ends in deadlock

The meeting between the Federal Government and the leadership of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) held on Tuesday ended without an agreement, The Star has gathered.

It was gathered that the meeting held at the National Universities Commission (NUC) was headed by the Emeritus Professor, Nimi-Briggs.

A senior member of ASUU, who craved anonymity, disclosed that members of the Briggs renegotiation committee did not come with any new offer on the table.

The ASUU source disclosed that the committee pleaded with the university lecturers to suspend the ongoing strike, with promises that their concerns will be included in the 2023 budget.

According to the source, the meeting, which started at about 12 p.m. lasted for about three hours without any agreement reached.

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The ASUU President, Prof. Emmanuel Osodeke, while speaking in an interview on Channels Television’s programme, Politics Today, disclosed that the union would meet the Federal Government’s team on Tuesday.

Osodeke, on Monday night, said the union has reached an agreement with the government to adopt the University Transparency Accountability Solution (UTAS) as the payment platform for lecturers and suspend the strike.

“We have not had any serious communication though they have invited us for a meeting on one issue, tomorrow (Tuesday), which is the issue of renegotiation.

“You know that there are seven issues why we are on strike. They are inviting for discussion on issue of renegotiation tomorrow (Tuesday) which is renegotiation of the 2009 agreement,” the ASUU President had said.

ASUU embarked on a nationwide strike on February 14 over the adoption of the Integrated Personnel Payroll Information System (IPPIS) of the government as the payment system in the university sector.

They had also decried the poor funding of universities, non-payment of salaries and allowances of some of their colleagues, as well as the inability of the government to pay earned academic allowance to lecturers, among other issues.

The Star