Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) has knocked the Congress of University Academics (CONUA) for demanding invitation to be part of the ongoing discussion between the former and the Federal Government on various issues causing crises over the years in the nation’s public universities.
ASUU said CONUA is asking for the impossible.
The Federal Government had recently constituted a committee comprising government representatives and individuals outside the government as well as the representatives of ASUU to renegotiate the much-talked-about 2009 FG-ASUU Agreement to permanently resolve all the grey areas in the controversial document.
The committee is headed by Dr Ahmed Yayale, the former Head of Service of the Federation and current Chairman of Committee of Pro-Chancellors of Nigerian Federal Universities, and has since commenced sitting, leaving CONUA out completely.
For this, CONUA has sent a protest letter to the Federal Government and the chairman of the committee, requesting members’ inclusion in the committee to be part of the negotiation since the group, according to its national president, Dr Niyi Sunmonu, is an integral part of the university community and the issues to be discussed are also concerning them.
CONUA is a break-away group from ASUU and registered as an independent union during the tenure of Dr Chris Ngige as a Minister of Labour and Employment.
The president of the group explained further why CONUA’s voice is important in the negotiation, saying it will give broader perspectives to the discussion and make resolutions from it wholistic.
But reacting to CONUA’s submission on this matter as reported earlier by the Nigerian Tribune, the Lagos Zone Coordinator of ASUU, Prof Adelaja Odukoya, said it’s like CONUA does not know what it is asking for, describing the exclusion as a “real dumb.”
He asked rhetorically if CONUA, in the first instance, had any agreement to renegotiate with the government.
Odukoya, who is the dean of Faculty of Social Sciences at the University of Lagos, Akoka, said, “If they know they do, they should bring such agreement out.
“And if they were once part of ASUU as they argued in the media report, they should answer for themselves if they are part of ASUU now?
“So, they cannot leverage on what they were in the past but what they are now is the in-thing.
“So, they should wake up from their self-delusion as they have been used and dumbed by Ngige.
“And the earlier they realize that unionism etched on opportunism and charlatanism will always end in disgrace and heartbreak.
“They should realise that they have miscalculated. And if they have any iota of shame and any honour, they would not botch the idea of being included in the FGN-ASUU negotiation in whatever form.
“I particularly for one think that honour is not a commodity they have. And they should stop asking for undue relevance.”
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