While we
share the frustration of the students who are at the receiving end of the
protracted face-off between the federal government and the Academic Staff Union
of Universities (ASUU), we fail to understand the meaning of the mass action
being called by National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS) officials
following their visit to President Muhammadu Buhari last week. With the NANS
executive behaving more like political hirelings than students who should be
concerned about the ongoing strike that has kept them at home since 4th
November last year, it is little surprise that public universities in Nigeria
have continued to go down the ladder of academic ranking, even among their
peers in Africa.
There is
so much talk about the implications of ASUU strike on the coming general
election but that is the least of our problem. Election cannot be more
important than the future of our children. Unfortunately, the NANS officials
who visited the president acted as though they were procured for a political
objective. That perhaps explains why they would be promising the president 20
million votes at the poll rather than address the challenge of incessant
closure of their campuses due to the perennial ASUU strikes. In case it is lost
on these misguided students, it should be clear to the authorities that there
is no way we can develop our country until we revitalise key sectors like
education.
As we
have argued repeatedly, the hurried academic calendars which usually follow
these all-too-frequent ASUU strikes allow for very little attention to serious
studies while underfunding the education sector has had collateral damaging
effects, such that our universities have now become grotesque carcasses of
their former glorious selves. But dealing with the challenge requires more
than seasonal strikes by the lecturers while the federal government also needs
to understand the primacy of constant dialogue and keeping to agreements,
especially given the current realities. Whatever the issues are, it is
important for the federal government and ASUU to find common grounds because
what these strikes have done is to damage whatever remains of the credibility
of tertiary education in Nigeria.
Meanwhile,
it is also important for the authorities to do everything within their powers
to end the current strike and find a lasting solution to a phenomenon that has
virtually crippled tertiary education in our country. Much more important, the
federal government must learn never to sign any agreement it has no capacity or
willingness to implement. In giving conditions under which the lecturers will
go back to work, ASUU president, Dr Abiodun Ogunyemi said the Memorandum of
Action (MoA) signed in October 2017 “must be implemented fully before we can
even talk of suspension of the strike.”
It is unfortunate
that the federal government and ASUU had for several years now been locked in
running battles over the implementation of agreements reached. The consequences
have been lengthy industrial strikes by the lecturers, with the attendant
debilitating effects on educational development in particular and academic
pursuits in general. Therefore, going forward requires other critical
stakeholders in the education sector joining in the efforts to find a lasting
solution to what has become a perplexing national challenge. But in doing
this, the federal government must take the initiative so that we can
collectively come up with ways to reposition tertiary education in our country.
We
understand that the focus of the government, at all levels, is now on the coming
general election. But the current crisis in the education sector puts the
future of our children in jeopardy. The authorities must therefore find a way
to resolve the ongoing crisis so that ASUU can call off the strike.
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