ASUU And The Need For Intellectual Struggle

For a couple of decades, the integrity of the Nigerian University system has been erased and what remains is the urge for degrees instead of a functional University system where the hunger for knowledge can’t be quantified.

The lingering faceoff between the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) and the Federal Government has almost killed the University system due to incessant industrial actions which have at many times truncated academic activities and encouraged compressed calendars to enhance speed instead of focusing on impacting adequate knowledge. The Nigerian University system is in the mud and needs revival.

Imagine a four-year degree program running to six years due to industrial actions, this is happening in a nation where there is age limit for the mandatory national service under the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) and most importantly Job offers. Even agencies of the Federal Government put age limit in her advertisements for jobs offers of which many students would have been disqualified on age reason due to incessant strikes by their teachers while in school.

I have always been a pro-ASUU person but the way in which ASUU as a body has been handling the matter is a clear indication that the union is not what it ought to be; a gathering of the best brains of the nation.

How on Earth will Professors in different fields of life be gathering every now and then to decide on a way of fighting a carefree government but will decide on strike that has never yielded result. I posited in November 2018 that ASUU can go on strike for as long as they wish but should only resume when her requests are met but in March 2019, it resumed on mere agreement, as if it is not the same Federal Government that has always failed on its promises.

The 2020 ASUU strike that was made unpopular by the COVID-19 lockdown until the ban was lifted, lasted about 10 months but resumed on agreement again. Now ASUU has locked our Universities again to embark on another strike on the same 2009 agreement signed with the Federal Government and which has been renegotiated many times.

How has ASUU proved to be a gathering of intellectuals by not being able to device another way of fighting the Federal Government than putting the future of the children of the poor on the line?

Let’s come back to the University, if students should be asked about their opinion on ASUU strike, they would say the body has failed to make even the students, who they teach and for whom they claim to be fighting, realise the need for the strike. This is because many will blame ASUU for asking for what is not possible. How is payment of revitalization fund impossible? It is impossible because the students are not learners but pursuers of degrees.

Very few of the students understand that the fund requested by ASUU is not more than what a month proceed from oil can cater for. ASUU members teach students in class but cannot educate them on the reasons for embarking on strike.

In the current world, I expect ASUU to see issues clearly that strike is not helping matter and device other ways of fighting the Federal Government.

On Monday 7th February, 2022 ASUU declared a nationwide lecture-free day in our Universities and I expected that its members across each state of the federation will be made to gather at their respective state capitals for demonstration and press conferences. It is my opinion that if there is protest in all 36 state capitals and the Federal Capital Territory at the same time, followed by press conferences aired on radios and televisions across the country and beyond, even the international community will understand what is going on. But ASUU will rather gather for marathon meetings in secret and make a press conference and declare, as usual, a nationwide closure of our Universities.

Hardly can students and parents read the long text of the press conference, what matters is “Has ASUU declared strike?” Even the internal circular released by most chapters of ASUU do not address the inherent issues, they only pass the message of strike.

If ASUU wants to go on strike, it should go but not to come back and declare strikes over the same matter every now and then. It is a big slap on the face of the union.

It is high time ASUU realised that nobody is freaked by strike again, students and their parents, alike, now see it as a usual undated holiday that will only affect school calendars. The Federal Government sees it as a way for ASUU members to rest and do their personal businesses. Imagine students jumping up at the declaration of strike and government agents making ridiculous comments at ASUU for going on strike.

This though remains my personal opinion but I’m of the believe that ASUU should change their ways, devise another way of fighting the Federal Government and regain her lost glory as the biggest gathering of intellectuals in the country instead of the needless strikes which has done more harm than good to our University system.

 

 

Mustafa Akinsumbo Adedibu writes from the University of Maiduguri, Borno State, Nigeria.