Bishop laments alleged govt insensitivity to students’ plight

Worried by incessant strikes by Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), the Bishop of Calabar Diocese (Anglican Communion), Dr. Nneoyi Egbe, has accused Federal Government of insensitivity to the plight of Nigerian students.

Egbe, a consultant lecturer at the University of Calabar, condemned government’s inability to arrive at a reasonable solution to end the lingering strike, stating that the situation has forced most students into living wayward lives.

According to the cleric, it is saddening and painful that tertiary institutions are underfunded with congested classrooms and dilapidated structures same as the primary and secondary schools across the country.

He said: “There are two sides to why ASUU is crying because they feel the pain and let me be honest, government is insensitive to the plight of the Nigerian child, the parents and to the future of this country. Any nation that does not invest in education has already programmed itself for destruction, which is why we are in this condition.

“And secondly, the little money the government releases is not properly managed at the institutions and ASUU has said let there be a system of monitoring to follow up and see what these universities are doing with the money because the money is not given to ASUU, it is given to the university management and just because institutions are not strong our vice chancellors are stronger than the universities so they wake up and take decisions and do what they like because nobody is monitoring them.”

The Anglican bishop and professor of radiography added that government should take deliberate steps in funding the education sector that has since been decayed.