Union dares FG, declares ‘no pay no work’

Fresh facts have emerged suggesting that the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) may be sabotaging the Federal Government’s renewed efforts to reform and resolve long-standing issues that often lead to strikes in Nigeria’s tertiary institutions.
  
It has also dared the Federal Government’s punitive ‘no work, no pay’ policy, declaring its readiness to equally impose a ‘no pay, no work’ action. 
  
Contrary to the widespread belief that the government failed to act, exclusive inside information shows that the government had engaged ASUU in active discussions until last Friday, just days before the union publicly declared its strike.
 
 According to insider sources, the crucial meeting, which lasted for hours, was attended by the government’s team, led by the Deputy Chairman of the Federal Government Negotiating Team, Senator Lanre Tejuosho, alongside key ASUU leaders. The talks were described as frank and constructive. 
 
 At the end of the meeting, The Guardian gathered that ASUU reportedly assured the government delegation that it would provide feedback after consulting its members.
  
However, sources from the government negotiation team told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) that ASUU never did. “They promised to get back after the meeting, but they didn’t. The next thing we saw was their public announcement of a nationwide strike,” a senior government source stated.

 Many Nigerians have often said that strikes could be avoided if the Federal Government were more responsive. But this time, insiders insist that the government had shown sufficient responsiveness by holding meetings and opening dialogue within the two-week notice period given by the union.
   
A government source, however, said: “They only got back on Sunday, after they had already gone public with the strike,” adding that ASUU had yet to commit to another meeting date.

REACTING to the government threat to implement a ‘no work no pay’ policy following the declaration of a two-week warning strike, the university’s lecturers declared a ‘np pay no work’ action.
  
Speaking with journalists in Kano, Chairman of ASUU, Bayero University, Kano (BUK), Prof Ibrahim Siraj, insisted that lecturers would not be deterred by the government’s threat. 
  
Siraj, who reminded that ASUU was not alien to several instruments being deployed by the government to break the union’s struggle, insisted that lecturers would not hesitate to impose ‘no pay no work’ policy in return. 
  
“So, that is the stand of the union. We are undeterred. We have seen this before. We have crossed the road. We’re also going to cross this road again,” he said.
  
The ASUU leader confirmed that members of the academic staff are fully in compliance with the directive of the mother body, stating that there will be no lectures, supervision of examinations, symposia, or meetings related to academic practice. 
  
Although, the lecturers supervised the last paper of the second semester examination on Monday, signalling the commencement of the second semester break, ASUU declared that no academic function would henceforth take place while the warning period of the industrial action lasts.