By Muhammad Abdullahi Sani. ASUU strike, FG declared war on ASUU, and the questions we have refused to ask...The parents are angry over the strike. I can understand their frustration. Nobody can be happy seeing their kids at home while they are supposed to be in school studying. The lecturers are parents too and ain't happy. Some are supposed to have graduated but can't because of the strike. So, who should the parents vent their anger on? The government or the union of lecturers?It is called a public university, funded with public funds, and we are all stakeholders. We are all meant to be concerned about the state of our public universities. But they are closed for the last six and a half months. Meanwhile, there are questions we are not asking as we take the side of the government or the lecturers.Why is ASUU on strike? Where is there funding for other things but education? Why will the government set up committees, invest resources in them for weeks to work, and reject the report after the conclusion of their work? Why is FG not bothered about students spending months at home instead of being in school? ASUU is on strike. Why will it take FG 6 months to make an offer? What is the content of the Nimi-Briggs committee report that they are hidden? Why are they not ready to make our universities attractive to international students and scholars like they use to be in the 80s? Other countries including small African countries are getting forex from international students, why is ours different? The VP recently told people below him that "we" need to do something about the ASUU strike and the only person (the president) that he should be talking to was not there. So, who is the "we"? Are we in a hopeless situation?Why are we not asking these questions? Let me briefly review the situation.There was a strike in 2020 just before the COVID-19 lockdown. The government refused to deal with the issues that led to the strike till after the lockdown. After a series of negotiations, ASUU and FG had a signed agreement they both called the Memorandum of Action (MoA). One of the items on the signed MoA was the renegotiation of the 2009 ASUU-FGN Agreement. Then, the Emeritus Prof Munzali's renegotiation committee was inaugurated in December 2020. The committee concluded the renegotiation with ASUU and submitted the report around June 2021.There was no action after the committee submitted the draft agreement. ASUU lobbied for the implementation of the 2020 MoA and to take action on the submitted report by the FG renegotiation committee without result. ASUU reached out to NASS leadership. They promised to intervene without any result. ASUU members in December 2021 wanted the strike to be declared but the executives pacified the members to exercise patience as religious leaders (NIREC) are intervening and meeting schedule. The intervention did not yield any results in January 2022.Since all the lobbying failed, ASUU has to activate the last option. "Strike".Then, ASUU declared the 4 weeks warning strike on the 14th of February. The government did not take it serious. On its expiration, it was extended by 8 weeks. That was when they picked up the Munzali's committee report to have a look and said it is not implementable. They inaugurated the Nimi-Briggs's renegotiation committee for another round of negotiation. ASUU agreed. By then the guys in the government were more concerned about the APC internal crisis and the primary elections. The 8 weeks elapsed without anything serious and it was rolled over for 12 weeks. By the end of the 12 weeks, the Nimi-Briggs report was ready with the Minister of Education.Shortly after then, Ngige and Keyamo were everywhere blackmailing ASUU of some N1.3trn that nobody knows the source of the information. They were even blackmailing the committee that FG set up. It was so embarrassing that the Briggs Renegotiation Committee had to respond. I am sure you read the paid advertorials from the committee on national dailies.Then, the Nimi-Briggs committee report was also set aside. And the minister came up with an "Award" of N30k to N60k salary increase on gross for lowest to highest level respectively on a take-it-or-leave-it basis. It was an arrogant presentation like he was talking to small boys. The ASUU team politely said they will present the offer to members for deliberation and revert even though it was obvious that it will be rejected outrightly by all the branches. The withheld salary was not discussed as it was not seen as an issue. You can only discuss that after the members accept the offer.Adamu Adamu was a fan of ASUU and had written several articles justifying the previous strike actions by the union. He is very familiar with how ASUU operates. ASUU usually doesn't disclose any discussion with the government to the Press till the offer is presented to members at the branches for deliberation. The minister took advantage of that principle and attempted to blackmail ASUU to the public. You are aware of his misinformation during the press briefing. He surprised everyone.So, whose fault is the prolonged strike?Meanwhile, for these last 6 months, the public was supposedly with ASUU on the struggle, a support they said ASUU is losing. So, the public supported ASUU but watched FG drag the strike for 6 months before making an offer. There was no outcry from the public. So, what is the impact of public support then? If that public support is withdrawn, what will be the effect? It is not very likely to have an impact. ASUU seems to be in the fight alone like they have always been. In March after the strike was declared, a member of the House of Reps raised a motion that will make it compulsory for public servants to patronize public schools for their kids. His reason was that if that happen, attention will be given to public schools. The motion was rejected by the House instantly. There was no outrage from the public. Unlike the rejected bill on women that attracted protest from women for weeks in the NASS complex, there was no protest from the public to sustain that motion on education. It appears we are enjoying the slave-master relationship that is between the public and the supposed public servants.But then, has the public ever been on the side of ASUU during any strike? What steps did they take for a quick resolution? The public never really supports ASUU's struggles for the universities and I feel their pain. They want their kids to go get a degree. They are unconsciously not bothered about the quality of teaching in the university. The state of their lecture rooms, lecture facilities, available learning resources, and hostels is not important. They are expected to MILT. After all, as long as they know somebody or have the cash to buy a job, the kids don't need to know anything to get a job. They just want a graduate to be celebrated. You can't be happy seeing that your child at home due to ASUU strike. Since you can't afford a private university and those emperors in government are too big for all of us to fight against, it's natural to transfer the anger to the oppressed side, the lecturers.Dear parents, ASUU did not keep your kids at home but FG. If FG is sincere and does the needful instead of threats, ASUU members are willing to return to class tomorrow. The whole crisis is shrouded with insincerity. If the government is sincere, the strike would not have lasted a month. They know the minimum to offer that will be acceptable if they want the strike to end. As Dele Ashiru, the Chairman of ASUU Unilag, rightly stated, the Federal Government declared war on ASUU, and lecturers in public varsities are only responding to the unacceptable treatment with the indefinite strike.To my colleagues, there is an invitation for a meeting in Abuja on Tuesday. Expect anything. But whatever happens in Abuja, you have 2 choices: to give up, get nothing after the 7 months of hardship, lose your withheld salaries, or endure and get what you are on strike for and get your withheld salary released.Dear Mall Adamu Adamu, please remind Mr president that Nigeria is still a developing nation and education is key to our developmental pace and must be placed on the priority list. No serious government will keep their universities inactive for 6 months and still counting. That displayed ego that shocked everyone must be set aside for a serious discussion to end this crisis. It can be resolved in a few days. The declared war against ASUU won't end it but dialogue.Education must be properly funded.

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The beautiful life of the Nigerian university lecturers that you do not know.ByAbdelghaffar Amoka Abdelmalik, PhDDepartment of PhysicsAhmadu Bello University, Zariaaaabdelmalik@abu.edu.ngFebruary 15, 2022.About 2 weeks ago, a friend visited me in my office and while we were discussing, he said he will love to be a lecturer. He is currently working in a good FG establishment with a relatively OK salary. He has worked there for about 10 years. I don't know what his salary is, but I asked him about the starting salary for a graduate and he said it's about N220,000 per month. I was like wow! That's not a bad monthly salary for a starter and he said yeah. Then, I told him that coming to academics is not a bad idea but that as a friend, he needs to know a bit about it before making a decision.So, I told him that if he should leave that job for a university lecturing job, and since he has got no MSc degree yet, he will be employed as a Graduate Assistant (GA) with a starting salary of about N95,000 per month. Is he prepared to drop from close to N300,000 to N95,000? He was like that is unbelievable, you are underpaid. And I said that is not all. While you had been getting a promotion after a specified period in your organisation, in the university you won't be promoted after employment till you get a Master's degree.I continued. As a GA you will have to enrol in a master's program. There is no research grant for staff in training, so you may have to save your salary or take a loan to do the MSc research. As staff in training, you are expected to finish within 3 years. Whenever you are done, you will be upgraded to Assistant Lecturer to earn about N118,270 per month.As Assistant Lecturer you enrol for a PhD. There is still no PhD research grant except you are lucky to get a TETFund scholarship. If you aren't lucky, you save part of your salary for the PhD research which you are expected to finish within 5 years. It could take a longer time.3 years later you are expected to have published 1 journal paper or gone to conferences to present 2 papers from the research you did with your salary to be qualified for promotion. If you don't have that, the years you have taught do not matter, you will have to wait until you meet the said requirement. If you succeeded, you will be promoted to the rank of Lecturer II with a starting salary of about N129,724 per month.3 years later you are expected to have published 3 journal papers with conference papers from the research you did with your salary to be qualified for promotion to Lecturer I. If you don't have that, you will have to wait until you meet the requirement irrespective of the years you have taught. If you succeeded, you will get a salary of close to N160,809 per month as Lecturer I.The next promotion after another 3 years is to the rank of Senior Lecturer. To qualify for this rank, you must have obtained your PhD with at least 6 journal papers in recognised journals and 4 conference papers. Without meeting the waiting period, PhD, and publication requirement, you won't be promoted no matter the number of years and number of students you have taught. Note that you will do the research with your personal fund and pay for the publication with your personal fund. As a senior lecturer, you will have a salary of N222,229 per month. That is the salary of a starter in your organisation in same Nigeria.The promotion to the rank of Reader (Associate Professor) will come after 3 years and after meeting the research and publication requirements of 10 journal papers and 5 conference papers, PG supervision, etc. That earns you a salary of N277,179 per month. Then you become a Professor 3 years later after meeting its own research and publications requirement of 15 journal papers and 7 conference papers, PhD supervision, etc., to earn a salary of N332,833 per month.With the increasing number of students and loads of scripts to mark, teaching does not count for promotion but the output from the research that is not provided for. You save your salary to earn a promotion. No book grant, you buy books for yourself with your salary. Nigerian public University lecturers are perhaps the only workers that use their salary to work to achieve the criteria set for their promotion.I told him that if he should join the academics now, it will take him the next 12 years at least, to become a Senior Lecturer to earn the salary of a starter in his present organisation. And that since FG thinks the lecturers deserve no pay rise, it will take him the next 15 years of serious academic and research output to earn his present salary in his present organisation. Meanwhile, he will have to fund all that with his salary for that 15 years. I asked if he still want to be a lecturer and he was mute. He was like this is bad and not fair. Then I said, when you see us in class teaching with all smiles and doing our best, it is not because we have a good salary and working conditions, but because we love the job and try to manage the little we are receiving to get the job done.This is the life of the academic that you do not know. Their life may look glittering but it is not gold.The poor welfare and work environment are telling on the quality of the output from the university. Some lecturers, especially the younger ones, are already getting pissed off and leaving or planning to leave. So, how long can we sustain this? Everyone keeps saying every lecturer should have a side hustle and stop complaining. That will be the worst thing to happen to Nigerian universities. Some of our colleagues with side hustle just come to teach and leave to manage their side hustle. You can ask the students about the impact of such a lecturer on them. You don't want to have a university where lecturers just come to teach and leave for their side hustle. A university is not designed that way.President Buhari, Adamu Adamu, and Nasiru El-Rufai in 2013/2014 gave a detailed explanation of the several reasons why ASUU is always declaring strike actions. Adamu Adamu's articles on why ASUU is always on strike were something else. As a matter of fact, I have never seen a comprehensive article like El-Rufai's write-up in October 2013 that he titled: For those who do not understand "why ASUU is on strike". Go back and read their words and listen to their videos and stop behaving like you need a thinking cap.ASUU fight is for the survival of the system where you want your child to come for a degree program. We have helped the state governors to destroy public primary and secondary education. You have a choice to take side with the FG towards the destruction of the remnant of the education system or join the fight to save the system. The choice is all yours.©Amoka

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