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ASUU Declares Extension of Strike by Three Months
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The Academic Staff Union of Universities has extende its ongoing strike for another three months.
A statement signed by ASUU president, Prof. Emmanuel Osodeke, said this was to give the government enough time to satisfactorily resolve all the outstanding issues.
It also stated that the roll-over strike was effective from 12.01 am, May 9, 2021.
ASUU said it took this decision after its National Executive Council meeting which started on Sunday night at the Comrade Festus Iyayi National Secretariat, University of Abuja.
The statement read, “After extensive deliberations, noting Government’s failure to live up to its responsibilities and speedily address all the issues raised in the 2020 FGN/ASUU Memorandum of Action (MoA) within the additional eight-week roll–over strike period declared on 14th March 2022, NEC resolved that the strike be rolled over for twelve weeks to give Government more time to satisfactorily resolve all the outstanding issues.
“The roll-over strike action is with effect from 12.01 a.m. on Monday, 9th May 2022.”
The press release titled, ‘Update on ASUU roll-over strike,’ read, “The National Executive Council (NEC) of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) held an emergency meeting on Sunday, 8th May 2022 at the Comrade Festus Iyayi National Secretariat, University of Abuja, Abuja.
“The meeting was called to review developments since the Union declared an eight-week total and comprehensive roll-over strike action at the end of its emergency NEC meeting at the Comrade Festus Iyayi National Secretariat, University of Abuja, Abuja on 14th March, 2022. The strike action came on the heels of the Government’s failure to satisfactorily implement the Memorandum of Action (MoA) it signed with the Union in December 2020 on renegotiation of the 2009 FGN/ASUU Agreement, deployment of the University Transparency and Accountability Solution (UTAS), Earned Academic Allowances (EAA), funding for revitalization of public universities (both Federal and States), proliferation and governance issues in State Universities, promotion arrears, withheld salaries (owed for over 20 months in some cases), and Non-emittance of third-party deductions.”
It added that NEC noted with serious disappointment that the three-man Committee set up by the President and Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of the Federal Republic of Nigeria on 1st February 2022 to resolve the lingering issues between ASUU and FGN had not called a single meeting to date.
“NEC was equally disappointed that ASUU’s only meeting with the Professor Nimi Briggs-led Renegotiation Committee did not reflect the expected level of understanding, preparation and clarity that undergird collective bargaining going by the Committee’s confession of “going about consulting stakeholders”. Unless urgent steps are taken to redirect the Committee on concluding a draft Agreement that has been pending since May 2021, its activities may end up as another wild goose chase,” it read.
ASUU NEC also condemned Federal Government’s cavalier attitude towards the strike action in the last twelve weeks, saying the government’s resort to the use of starvation as a weapon for breaking the collective resolve of ASUU members and undermine our patriotic struggle to reposition public universities in Nigeria was ill-advised and may prove counterproductive.
The statement said, “NEC was shocked that public universities have remained closed for about three months while members of the political class were busy purchasing expression of interest and nomination forms worth several millions of Naira in preparations for 2023 elections! Those in power turned their back on our degraded universities as they shuttle between Europe and America to celebrate the graduation of their children and wards from world class universities. This speaks volumes on the level of depravity, insensitivity, and irresponsibility of Nigeria’s opportunistic and parasitic political class.
“The result of the criminal neglect of education and gross mismanagement of the nation’s patrimony is evident in the collapse of the security architecture of our nation. Insecurity is getting worse by the day and spreading like the harmattan inferno in hitherto peaceful and secured parts of Nigeria, including university campuses. ASUU warns, once more, that unless something drastic is done to reverse these ugly trends, the country may be headed for a state of anarchy.
“NEC condemned the provocative statements of some government functionaries and salutes the Nigerian Labour Congress, patriotic students’ groups and civil society organisations who have taken steps towards resolving the current labour dispute with the Nigeria government.
However, Osodeke told our correspondent, that the union had yet to receive any notice of meeting from any Federal Government ministry.
Some of ASUU’s demands include the release of revitalisation funds for universities, renegotiation of the 2009 FGN/ASUU agreement, release of earned allowances for university lecturers, and deployment of the UTAS payment platform for the payment of salaries and allowances of university lecturers.
The Punch
Four Nigerian-Americans have won elective positions in the November 3 midterm elections in the United States, while the outcome of another candidate, Segun Adeyina, remained pending in Georgia as votes were being counted.
The winners are Will Jawando, Junior Ezeonu, Oye Owolewa and Carol Kazeem, who secured positions in local government and State legislatures across Maryland, Texas, Washington, DC, and Pennsylvania.
In Maryland, Jawando, the Democratic candidate, won the race for Montgomery County executive, defeating Republican candidate Esther Wells.
Results published by NBC Washington on Wednesday showed Jawando polling 237,383 votes, representing 78.15 per cent, against Wells’s 66,383 votes, or 21.85 per cent, with 72 per cent of the expected votes counted.
Jawando, who previously served on the Montgomery County Council, is the son of a Nigerian father and an American mother. His Nigerian heritage and political career have featured in reports by The Baltimore Banner and The Washington Post.
In Texas, 27-year-old Ezeonu secured a seat in the state House of Representatives for District 101. He had defeated incumbent Chris Turner in the Democratic primary and was the only candidate on the ballot for the November general election after no Republican entered the race.
According to his campaign biography, Ezeonu was born in Onitsha, Anambra State, and moved to Texas at the age of two.
He was elected to the Grand Prairie City Council in 2021 and later became the city’s youngest mayor pro tempore.
In Washington DC, Owolewa, the Democratic candidate, won an at-large seat on the District of Columbia Council.
Local publication – The 51st – reported that Owolewa secured 69 per cent of the vote, against 21 per cent recorded by independent candidate Elissa Silverman.
Owolewa, a pharmacist and son of Nigerian immigrants from Kwara and Osun states, previously served as the District’s elected shadow representative.
The position allows its holder to advocate for Washington, DC, statehood but does not confer voting rights in the US Congress.
Meanwhile, Kazeem, also a Democrat, retained her seat in the Pennsylvania House of Representatives, representing District 159.
The result of Adeyina’s contest in Georgia had yet to be called as of Wednesday, with votes still being counted.
Democrats, on Tuesday, won full control of the US Congress in a sweeping midterm rout with a landslide of upsets that delivered a crushing rebuke of President Donald Trump and his Republican Party.
The victory handed Democrats both the House of Representatives and Senate, giving them power to block Trump’s agenda and investigate alleged corruption for the last two years of his presidency.
The vote reflected deep anger over living costs, tariffs and Trump’s war against Iran, which has sent fuel prices soaring and compounded dissatisfaction with an already deeply unpopular president.
Trump struck a conciliatory note despite his history of questioning election results, telling The New York Times: “I am absolutely willing to accept those results” and promising to “work with the Democrats.”
But minutes later on social media, the 80-year-old signaled how he intends to deal with Democratic attempts to pass laws, posting a picture of a red baseball cap emblazoned: “VETO.”
The Democrats’ decisive Senate breakthroughs came in Kansas and Iowa, the fifth and sixth Republican-held seats to fall in the extraordinary “blue wave” election night.
In Kansas, Methodist minister Adam Hamilton defeated Republican incumbent Roger Marshall, becoming the first Democrat elected to the Senate from the reliably conservative state since 1932.
Iowa had not elected a Democratic senator since 2008, again illustrating the scale of the party’s inroads into Republican strongholds.
The upsets followed victories in Texas, South Carolina, North Carolina and Ohio, where voters rejected Republican candidates despite Trump’s intensive efforts to rally his supporters.
Texas was a political bombshell.
Democrat James Talarico ousted a Trump-backed Senate candidate, while Gina Hinojosa unseated Republican governor Greg Abbott, ending decades of Republican control of the state’s top office.
Democrats also protected key Senate seats of their own, including Jon Ossoff’s in Georgia and an open seat in New Hampshire.
Republicans had held a 53-47 Senate majority.
The six-seat Democratic gain proved sufficient for networks to project a takeover despite some races remaining unresolved.
Democrats also captured the House after flipping Republican-held districts in states stretching from Pennsylvania and New Jersey to Kentucky, Arizona and North Carolina.
Some victories came in territory Trump had carried comfortably in 2024, despite Republican attempts to shore up House seats by redrawing electoral boundaries.
One bellwether was Indiana, where Democrat J.D. Ford defeated Republican congresswoman Victoria Spartz in a district Trump won by 17 points. Analysts had identified an upset there as a warning of a much wider Democratic advance.
In Georgia, former Atlanta mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms became the first Black woman elected governor in US history, while other Democratic gains extended to statehouses across the country.
Republicans had some bright spots in Florida, where Trump-backed Byron Donalds won the governorship, becoming the state’s first Black governor, and Ashley Moody kept a Senate seat.
George Washington University professor Todd Belt called the Democratic advance “a big wipeout and a strong repudiation of Donald Trump and his policies,” citing voters’ concerns about the economy, corruption and the Iran conflict.
Democrats will now be able to block Trump’s legislation, investigate his administration over corruption allegations, the Iran war and immigration enforcement, and use Senate control to thwart judicial appointments and senior nominations.
Robert Garcia, a Democrat expected to lead the powerful House Oversight Committee, warned Republicans on social media: “LAWYER UP.”
House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries declared Trump’s MAGA movement “on the run from sea to shining sea.”
Jeffries is also positioned to become the first Black speaker of the House when the new Congress convenes in January, if elected by his colleagues.
For many voters, the central concern was Trump’s stewardship of the economy.
“Rent, groceries, utility bills, and property taxes keep climbing,” 24-year-old Los Angeles voter Taylor Cook told AFP.
AFP
The former Vice President and African Democratic Congress (ADC) presidential candidate, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, has vowed that his campaign in Sokoto will proceed despite alleged intimidation, declaring that the party will resist any attempt to turn Nigeria into a one-party State.
Atiku stated this on Tuesday in Abuja while addressing the press on developments ahead of the party’s campaign in Sokoto.
He said what is unfolding in Sokoto is not ordinary political competition but a calculated campaign to frustrate the ADC, obstruct its campaign and deny Nigerians the freedom to choose.
“Public facilities that should be available to every political party for legitimate campaign activities have been blocked. Logistical support has been withheld. These are not harmless administrative delays. They are deliberate attempts to deny ADC a level playing field,” he said.
Atiku alleged that the leadership of the Department of State Services was recruiting people to stage protests in Sokoto to create disorder and give the APC-controlled state government a pretext to impose a curfew and prevent the campaign from taking off.
“We know where some of these protesters are assembled: an office behind Zenith Bank on Koko Road. Trucks are stationed there and dispatched to key points, including roundabout. These mobilised protesters are causing gridlock. Commuters are being threatened and, in some cases, beaten,” he said.
He said security agencies existed to protect Nigerians and uphold the law, not to recruit protesters or help a political party manufacture a crisis.
“This is not intelligence work. It is political interference dressed in official uniform. I call on every officer involved to stop immediately and return to constitutional duty of impartial service,” he said.
Atiku accused the Tinubu administration of devoting too much energy to weakening credible opposition and too little to solving the problems facing Nigerians in the last three- and-a-half years.
