ASUP, COEASU Strike: Police Molest Protesting Students and Lecturers

The Nigeria Police, yesterday humiliated protesting lecturers and students of the nation’s polytechnics and colleges of education with tear gas and watergun.

The protest which held at the Federal Secretariat, Abuja, was disrupted when police officers fired tear gas at the protesters who vowed not to leave the venue.

The polytechnic lecturers have been on strike since October 4, 2013 while the college of education lecturers embarked on strike on December 18, 2013.

The protest was organised to show displeasure at the federal government’s handling of the strike by polytechnic lecturers and college of education lecturers.

Members of the Academic Staff Union of Polytechnics (ASUP) and the Colleges of Education Academic Staff Union (COEASU) have expressed dismay over  government’s “nonchalance” to their demands to fix polytechnics and colleges of education in the country.

ASUP president, Chibuzor Asomugha, accused the supervising minister of education, Nyesom Wike, of embarking on a propaganda mission to discredit their members instead of addressing the issues.

Both unions are protesting the failure of government to kick-start the re-negotiation of an agreement it signed with them in 2009 which was due in July 2012.

ASUP is demanding the implementation of CONTISS 15 migration for the lower cadres in the polytechnics and the release of the White Paper on the visitations to federal polytechnics more than one year after the exercise.

It is also demanding an end to the HND/BSc dichotomy.

On its part, COEASU is protesting the “non-accreditation of its programmes…corruption of the security architecture of the colleges through outsourcing to settle political allies at the detriment of staff and government’s huge investment” and the “non-payment of pension/death benefits to families of deceased members.”

Asomugha raised doubts over federal government’s sincerity in addressing the HND/BSc dichotomy saying that government did not invite the union into a committee it recently set up, headed by the Secretary to the Government of the Federation Anyim Pius Anyim.

Source: Leadership