ASUU Supports SSANU's And NASU's Warning Strike

ASUU rgues that all university employees should receive their withheld paychecks from FG

According to the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), it has no objections whatsoever to the members of the Non-Academic Staff Union of Universities (NASU) and the Senior Staff Association of Nigerian Universities (SSANU) going on a one-week warning strike.

It said that, if required, unions and any other organizations operating within the university system are free to do so.

This was said by Professor Emmanuel Osodeke, the National President of ASUU, in an interview.

His response to the one-week warning strike that SSANU and NASU announced on Monday was requested.

Even if ASUU would have preferred to remain silent about SSANU and NASU starting an industrial action, Osodeke stated that it is not ideal for one union to use the actions of another to support its decision to go on strike or emphasize its demands from employers.

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ASUU, according to Osodeke, would never do such as each union has the authority to negotiate on issues that impact its members in its own manner.

“And that is what we call unionism and not about what your employers do for another union members.

“You bargain on a separate note and based on your conviction about what you are fighting for and that is what is ideal in unionism.

“And so it not that because you pay ASUU members four months salaries, you must also pay four months to us as SSANU and NASU or NAAT.

“That is not correct because ASUU members were owed seven and half months and not four months.

“So, there is no point in this case for NASU, SSANU to be referring to ASUU before getting what they believe is their entitlements from the employers.

“But even at that, we are not saying that SSANU and NASU or any other union have no rights to withdraw their service to press homex their demand from government.

“They are indeed have the rights to do so,” he stated.

Osodeke gave the Federal Government advice on how to prevent disruptions at the country's institutions, even as he declared that ASUU members would carry on with their duties as they are not on strike.

He felt that it would have been more honorable and better if the Federal Government could have taken care of other necessities as well as the backlog of salaries that have been withheld from university employees across all unions.

“It should do so if truly believes in its renewed hope mantra and the spirit of development as it is not advisable to allow the system to be plunged into another rounds of industrial actions before it starts to take action.”

In addition to other requests, he stated that ASUU is still demanding that members' salaries be paid for the final three and a half months that their paychecks have been delayed. Osodeke emphasized that: “The Federal Government should just allow all the backlog of salaries and other matters of all the university workers to go once and for all and start the system on a new and clean stale so that the nation's university system would enjoy non-interrupted system any more.

“So, we hope that the government will do what is right to safe the system,” he concluded.