The
Academic Staff Union of Universities has blamed former military
dictator, Gen. Ibrahim Babangida for the present problems bedeviling the
nation's education sector. The
union believed that the former military President presided over what it
described because the dictatorship of the International Monetary Fund
and Structural Adjustment Programme, whose policies were used to “kill
public schools” in the late 1980s.
The
union, which said its four-month-old strike would continue until
government shows genuine commitment to the 2009 agreement, also called
on government to reject “the reintroduction of SAP through the rear
door.”
The
chairman of ASUU, Obafemi Awolowo University, Prof. Ade Akinola, in a
statement on Monday, said the us government should show patriotism and
make certain that the university teachers returned to work.
He said, “Patriotism demands that the us government should reject the dictate of the international Monetary Fund (IMF) and the reintroduction of SAP through the rear door, under the superintendence of the Minister of Finance, Dr. (Mrs.) Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala.
“Otherwise, why the rush to imbibe this strange doctrine that basic education is what Nigeria needs? The implication of that is that government should minimally spend or disengage from spending on tertiary education. Yet, we are in this where knowledge may be the difference. Wilful collapse of public institutions and subordination of national interest to private one must stop.
“ASUU insists that the strike continues until government shows genuine commitment to the 2009 FGN/ASUU agreement as reinforced by the MoU of January 24, 2012 as it won't participate this deliberate decimation of public university system.”
The OAU-ASUU branch chairman said government's patriotism became necessary “to avoid this cycle of institutional collapse.”
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