ABUJA – NIGERIA: The ASUU strike 2013 continues, but the latest update is that the union is meeting on Monday and could call off the strike by Thursday.
Members of the Academic Staff Union of Nigerian Universities will hold a referendum on Monday, the first time the lecturers are meeting after the marathon meeting between union leadership and President Goodluck Jonathan.
Following that meeting, union leadership pledged to take the deal Jonathan offered to union members.
A source told The Punch that a key component of the deal was the government promising to inject N1.1 trillion into public universities over five years. That amounts to N220 billion every year, beginning in 2014. An additional N100 billion would be for 2013.
One Nigerian Naira equals one cent in U.S. dollars.
The source said the strike will be called off sometime next week, adding that both parties “showed commitment toward ending the crisis.”
“The President in particular showed that he was serious about ending the strike and that was why he offered to release over N1.1 trillion to the universities in the next five years,” the source said.
The money would be released every quarter, processed through the Central Bank of Nigeria, and the National Universities Commission and the Trade Union Congress would be the joint guarantors of the agreement, with the minister of education as the implementation officer.
The union’s only demands are that the government have all monetary and regulatory agencies sign the injection agreement, a source told NGTrends.com.
“The reason we will ensure this is that we don’t want argument tomorrow that the agreement was entered in error or that they don’t know the implication of signing the agreement,” the source said. “If possible, documents that will provide for automatic deduction of the agreed money at a particular/agreed date must be provided.”
And the Nigerian Tribune reports that the the union members will review the four-month old strike on Monday and decide whether or not to end it, during the first union member meeting since the leadership met with President Jonathan.
The National Executive Council of the union will then meet on Wednesday in Kano to finalize whatever decision the members make.
__Source: Epoch Times
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