ASUU to students: Don’t worry, we’ll cover lost ground

The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) on Monday promised to cover the academic period lost to its strike.

Biodun Ogunyemi, the national president, gave the assurance in an interview with the NAN on Monday in Lagos.

NAN reports that lecturers in public universities, under the aegis of ASUU, embarked on what they described as total, comprehensive and indefinite nationwide strike on August 13.

The lecturers protested non-implementation of the 2009 agreement and the 2013 memorandum of understanding it entered into with the federal government.

The union suspended the strike conditionally on September 18 after dialogues with a federal government delegation headed by the Chris Ngige, minister of labour.

According to Ngige, “We wish to assure our students and parents that they do not have any cause to worry over the lost period while the strike lasted.

“As we have always said, it is not our intention to be disrupting academic activities in our institutions.

“What we are pressing for is for us to have a better system for the benefit of our students and, of course, the nation at large.

“We cannot continue with what we may call business as usual in the running of university system in our country.’’

The ASUU leader told NAN that the union had students’ interest at heart.

“Now that the strike has been suspended, our lecturers are back in full force with renewed energy to cover the lost ground.

“Having said this, we will also like to state that the union is hopeful that government will faithfully implement the Memorandum of Action it entered into with union on Sept. 18, to avoid any other issues,” Ogunyemi said.

He said that there was no evidence so far to show that the Federal Government would not keep its own part of the bargain.

“This is a government of change; we are watching and waiting patiently to realise the implementation within that time frame,” he said.