The Federal Government and Academic Staff Union of Polytechnics (ASUP), will be meeting on Wednesday in Abuja, to begin negotiations on the indefinite strike embarked upon by the latter on Monday.
In telephone interview on Monday, ASUP National President, Usman Dutse, told BusinessDay that the issues over which they were embarking on the strike action, have lingered with the Federal Government reneging on its part of the agreements.
ASUP commenced “total and comprehensive indefinite” strike on Monday, due to the Federal Government’s failure to fulfil the outstanding agreement made with the union in 2014.
The union and the ministry of labour, on October 16, 2017 held a meeting, in order to develop a memorandum of understanding to resolve the issues, according to ASUP President.
The strike was to compel the Federal Government to honour the agreement it had reached with the union, which is raising concerns that the government has not demonstrated its preparedness to honour the agreement.
According to Dutse, “The issues have been there for sometime and there are concerns, including non-implementation of the NEEDS Assessment report in 2014, and the Amendment Bill of the Polytechnics Act.
“They have reached out to us, there is going to be a meeting on Wednesday with the ministry of labour at 12 noon.
“It is all policy issues and once the government show their commitment. I cannot categorically say when we will settle the issues with the Federal Government”.
He said during the strike there would not be any form of academic activities in all Polytechnics
The NEEDS assessment report recommended the injection of N6.5billion into the polytechnic education in 2014, and this has risen to about N8bn now.
LAIDE AKINBOADE-ORIERE
