We have met 80% of ASUU’s demands, Wike declares

IN  its bid to end the ongoing strike by the members of Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), The Federal Government Wednesday said it has met 80 per cent of demands of Union.

The supervising Minister of Education, Chief Nyesom Wike, disclosed this in Abuja at a meeting with leaders of the Nigerian Union of Teachers (NUT), who had threatened to join ASUU in its strike, which has lasted for three months now.

According to the Minister: “Before now, there has been problem between the Federal Government and ASUU regarding to the agreement that was signed in 2009, from that time to 2012and number of issues; I can tell you reliably that government have met at least 80% of those demands.

“The two major issues that has been lingering has to do with the issues of earned allowances of lecturers who maybe sometimes marks papers, supervise them in their projects, so cumulatively, they said government is owing them N92 billion on those earned allowances and also that they are expecting that government should every year release N400 billion as infrastructure development in the various universities.

“On the earned allowances, government said, you say what we are owing you is N92 billion, this is N30 billion, start paying it lets know where it takes us to, if it is not enough, then we may take it as a debt and then let us try to find a way settle it, but start with this.''

He explained that the Federal Government had promised to increase the N100 billion it had earlier released to the universities for infrastructure upgrade to N150 billion by next year.

“If government is going to increase the N100 billion for example and the N100 billion that will come from TetFund, what government is going to be giving is about N200 billion; not from Federal Budget, they still have their budget from the normal Federal budget.''

He disclosed: “I was in touch with ASUU president yesterday, he said that they are still collating results from their various state branches and that we should give them till Thursday to get back to us on what they have decided.''

Wike however appealed to members of the Nigerian Teachers Union to assist the government in making sure that the strike is called off. http://www.ngrguardiannews.com/national-news/134450-we-have-met-80-of-asuus-demands-wike-declares