ACADEMIC STAFF UNION OF UNIVERSITIES (ASUU)

TEXT OF THE PRESS CONFERENCE OF THE ACADEMIC STAFF UNION OF

UNIVERSITIES (ASUU) HELD AT THE END OF THE NATIONAL EXECUTIVE
COUNCIL (NEC) MEETING HELD AT THE OBAFEMI AWOLOWO UNIVERSITY, ILE-
IFE, OSUN STATE, 11TH-12TH MAY, 2024

I. PROTOCOLS
II. INTRODUCTION
Comrades and compatriots of the Press,
The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) held its National Executive Council
(NEC) meeting at the Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, between Saturday 11th and
Sunday 12th May, 2024. At the meeting, the union undertook a dispassionate and
comprehensive review of the status of its engagements with Federal and State
Governments on how to reposition Nigeria’s public universities for global reckoning
and competitiveness. The meeting also took a critical look at the worsening living and
working conditions in our universities and the nation at large. The meeting received
alarming reports on the failed promises of the Federal and State governments towards
addressing the lingering issues that forced the union to embark on the nationwide strike
action of February–October 2022. NEC sadly noted that there are no serious efforts to
redress the ugly situation. Reports available to NEC indicate that an increasing number
of Nigerian academics died while thousands of others are nursing life-threatening
ailments occasioned by work-related stress, absolute pauperization, and
multidimensional insecurity. ASUU calls this press conference to intimate members of
the fourth estate of the realm and indeed all Nigerians of the grim situation our
universities have been grappling with since Dr. Chris Ngige and his collaborators
truncated over five years of government’s engagements with ASUU at the point of
signing a negotiated agreement in 2021.

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III. Renegotiation of FGN/ASUU 2009 Agreement
As our union has consistently stated, salary awards are no substitutes to a negotiated
Agreement. Each negotiated Agreement between the Federal Government of Nigeria
(FGN) and ASUU is a comprehensive package that captures not the just salary
component but also the requirements for benchmarking a competitive university
system designed for addressing the developmental challenges of Nigeria. ASUU’s
demand for negotiated salaries and other conditions of service is anchored on the
International Labour Organisation’s (ILO) Convention No. 98 which underscores the
principle of collective bargaining. The last FGN/ASUU Agreement was in 2009.
Consequent upon the union’s advocacy spanning almost one decade, our union went
into the renegotiation with the FGN in 2017. We started with the Wale Babalakin-led
Joint Renegotiation Committee. Emeritus Prof Munzali Jibril took over when
negotiation broke down owing to Dr. Babalakin’s highhandedness and fixation to
unworkable anti-worker ideas as terms of agreement. Also, at some point, the Federal
Government dropped Prof. Jibril and directed Late Emeritus Prof. Nimi Biggs to take
over the negotiation. A draft Agreement was reached with the Professor Briggs-led
Committee in 2021. Unfortunately, agents of the Buhari government refused to approve
of the draft Agreement for reasons best known to them!

Compatriots of the Press would recall the infamous role played by the then Minister of
Labour and Employment, Dr. Chris Ngige, in truncating the successful conclusion of
the FGN-ASUU renegotiation process that had lasted for more than four years. The
reviewed agreement with the Briggs-led government team has remained in its draft
form from 2021 till date. One consequence of this anti-labour stance is the preventable
loss of tested Nigerian scholars to universities elsewhere in Africa and all over the
world where their expertise is better appreciated. Even with the paltry salary award, the
current take-home pay of a professor at bar is about $500/month! In the face of a
heightened tax regime, the what a professor at bar earns is about $400 per month which
is a scandalous under-valuation of the scholars.

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It is therefore not surprising that the Nigerian University System is continuing to sink
deeper and deeper into crisis of underdevelopment. The symptoms of this festering
crisis are there for all to see: low academic staff morale, widespread discontent among
staff and students, fast diminishing sense of patriotism manifesting in the Japa
syndrome, and many more! For the umpteenth time, ASUU calls on the President Tinubu-
led administration to immediately set in motion the process leading to the review and signing of
the Nimi Briggs-led renegotiated draft agreement as a mark of goodwill and assured hope for
Nigeria’s public universities. Nigerian academics are tired of platitudes laced with disdain for
intellectuals; only concrete steps to restore their eroded dignity and degraded lives can guarantee
lasting peace on our campuses.

IV. Governing Councils in Public Universities

NEC observed with dismay the continued erosion of autonomy of public universities,
contrary to the provisions of the Universities Miscellaneous Act (1993, 2012). The illegal
dissolution of Governing Councils by the Tinubu Government and many State
Governments has paved way for all manner of illegalities in the Nigerian University
System. University administrations now place advertisements for the appointment of
Vice-Chancellor without authorization from the appropriate quarters – the Governing
Councils. Outgoing Vice-Chancellors, working in cahoots with the Federal and State
Ministries of Education, are illegally running the universities on a daily basis. They
routinely usurp the powers of Governing Councils to recruit and discipline staff as well
as manage university finances in manners bereft of transparency and accountability.

It is therefore stating the obvious to say that these and sundry activities that run
contrary to the extant laws are compounding cases of corruption in our universities.
ASUU condemns these anomalies in strong terms and calls on the Federal Government
and the equally affected State Governments to respect the Laws establishing their
universities. Universities are supposed to be the bastion of democratic ethos and
practices. We cannot entrench sustainable democratic culture in Nigeria if universities
are run by the whims and caprices of individuals no matter how knowledgeable or
powerful. We therefore restate our demand for reinstating Governing Councils whose

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tenures are yet to lapse and reconstitute those whose tenures had lapsed so that our
universities can run in accordance with their Laws. ASUU shall do all within its powers
to ensure that the dignity of the academia is fully restored in line with practices
obtainable in forward-looking climes. So, Nigerians should hold the Federal and State
Governments responsible if the matter of governing councils is allowed to snowball into
an avoidable industrial crisis.

V. Unending Grip of the Integrated Personnel and Payroll Information System

Compatriots of the Press, it is now public knowledge that IPPIS is a fraudulent platform
that inflicted unprecedented hardship on Nigerian academics and corruptly distorted
university operations with respect to the payroll management. More importantly,
ASUU has consistently rejected IPPIS because it grossly violates the autonomy of our
universities. Unfortunately, we are worried that the grip of IPPIS on the universities is
far from being eased more than four months after the government mooted the idea of
exiting universities and other tertiary institutions from the discredited payment
platform. As at today, the salaries of our members are still whimsically withheld just as
third-party deductions such as cooperative contributions, pension deductions and
union check-off dues are not released. The platform, with all its encumbrances, is used
to pay our members under the disguise of the “New IPPIS” contrary to the
understanding reached at the 11th January, 2024 stakeholders’ meeting held at the
National Universities Commission (NUC).

ASUU’s position remains unchanged: Government should revert to quarterly releases

of university funds to enable the institutions design and implement their salary
payment plans under the supervision of their Governing Councils. This is the
touchstone of a truly autonomous university system as experienced in Nigerian
universities of the 1960s and 1970s. In the interest of industrial harmony, government
should direct the immediate release of all outstanding deductions, unpaid promotion
arrears and salaries of university academics which were unjustly withheld by the
corruption-ridden IPPIS regime.

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VI. Core Curriculum Minimum Academic Standard
NEC received reports that, despite its earlier rejection of the NUC-imposed Core
Curriculum Minimum Academic Standard (CCMAS), the Commission is unrelenting in
enforcing its implementation with effect from current academic session. Almost all
universities are being burdened with funding resource verification for migrating from
the erstwhile Basic Minimum Academic Standard (BMAS) to the new academic
benchmark. ASUU considers these developments as infractions that are unhealthy for
the Nigerian University System. University senates are the authorities recognized by
university laws to initiate academic programmes and award degrees, diplomas and
certificates in same. The regulatory function of the NUC is mainly to ensure that
universities operate according to their laws, rules and regulations, not to breath down
the necks of universities. Once again, ASUU calls on the NUC to join forces with the
union to address the challenges of underfunding, understaffing, academic staff
turnover, and other pressing problems affecting quality teaching, learning, research and
community service in our universities.

VII. Proliferation of Universities

Our dear compatriots, as you are possibly aware, the matter of proliferation of
universities was one of the issues that led to the series of strike actions between 2020
and 2022.The union demanded and still demands that the 2020 ASUU-FGN
Memorandum of Action (MoA) which stressed the need to review the NUC Act to make
it more potent in arresting the reckless and excessive establishment of universities be
fully implemented. During the lifetime of the last legislative session, a joint committee
of ASUU and NUC submitted a draft bill to the National Assembly on this matter.
However, that bill did not see the light of the day. The fallout from that is the reckless
manner by which both the Federal and State governments have continued to create
universities without preparations for their funding. This recently came to a worrisome
height when a sitting Governor boastfully declared that he would establish ten
universities in his State before the end of his tenure!

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Nigeria boasts of over 170 universities comprising 79 that are owned by individuals and
private organizations while 43 and 48 belong to the Federal and State governments
respectively. However, about 95% of the students are still found in public universities
which underscores the imperative of prioritizing the federal and state universities in
Nigeria. Rather than supporting our advocacy for adequate funding of public
universities, each Senator is surreptitiously pushing for the establishment of a
university as part of their constituency projects while Visitors to State Universities who
could not fund existing universities are creating two or more purely for electoral gains.
This trend has put much stress on the intervention funds of the Tertiary Education
Trust Fund (TETFund) which are diverted to establish new universities contrary to the
Fund’s Act. ASUU shall explore all legal means to resist the pervasive moves by
politicians to keep proliferating crisis centres for the children of the poor in the name of
universities. We urge the President Tinubu-led administration to refrain from further
proliferation of universities and refocus the system. What we need are universities that
are adequately empowered to address the challenges confronting Nigeria and stand
should-to-shoulder with their peers elsewhere in the world and mushroom glorified
high schools.

VIII. Funding of Universities

Over the years, ASUU’s engagements with successive governments on funding of
public universities have been predicated on scientifically established benchmark of
annual budgetary requirements for education. Lately, the United Nations Fund for
Population Activities’ (UNFPA) specification of 15%-20% educational budget for
underdeveloped countries like Nigeria has been advocated by our union. However,
there was no year in the last 10 years when allocation to education in the national
budget was more above 10%. The average has hovered between 5% and 6%. ASUU
decries the deliberate and continued underfunding of State and Federal universities
because it degrades the capacity of the institutions and further under-develops Nigeria.

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The Federal Government recently decided to further reduce the resources available for
TETFund intervention by channelling the fund accruable to the agency to the Students’
Education Loan Scheme. This is antithetical to the original intendment of the Law
establishing the Education Tax Fund which now operates as TETFund. Grants from
TETFund as an intervention agency should not replace adequate and regular budgetary
allocations by federal and state governments for capital and recurrent expenditures in
the public universities. So, NEC enjoins the Federal Government not to divert TETFund
resources to funding loans so as not to water down the impact of its intervention. In
addition, both Federal and State Government should rise to their responsibility of
adequate funding to arrest the emergent rot and decay that are becoming more
noticeable on the campuses of Nigeria’s public universities in spite the intervention
efforts of TETFund.

IX. Creeping Fascism in Some Nigerian Universities

Compatriots of the Press, we wish to, once again, call attention to the unending crises at
the Kogi State University (KSU), Anyingba; Ebonyi State University (EBSU), Abakaliki;
Lagos State Universities (LASU), Ojoo; Ambrose Alli University (AAU), Ekpoma;
Federal University of Technology Owerri (FUTO), Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu
University (COOU), Igbariam; and other universities where our members have been
illegally sacked and their salaries are withheld for unjustifiable reasons. Justice delayed,
is justice denied. ASUU is particularly disturbed at the seeming travesty of justice in the
judgment delivered against our members at the Kogi State University, Anyigba, after
seven years of waiting. Without doubt, the undue elongation of the court proceedings
has created untold hardship on our members who were unjustly sacked. We are equally
dissatisfied at the developments at EBSU where, rather than implement the court
judgement, the university is again prolonging legal action by appealing the judgement.
NEC, while appreciating the intervention of NLC and the Visitor to EBSU, calls on
Visitors to State Universities where our members are being persecuted to, as a matter of
urgency, take steps to resolve all lingering matters and give their universities a new
breathe of life. As for ASUU, we stand solidly with our members anywhere and
everywhere they are unjustly treated.
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X. Arrears of Earned Academic Allowances and Non-Release of Owed Salaries:
Compatriots of the Press, we feel saddened that the Federal Government has still not
paid the backlog of the Earned Academic Allowances (EAA) because a part of the
allowances was captured in the 2023 National Budget for Federal universities. The
December 2020 MoA between FGN and ASUU reaffirmed our understanding on
mainstreaming of EAA into lecturers’ monthly salaries while the next tranche of the
allowances was to be paid in 2021. However, the scheduled payment was not only
aborted, the mainstreaming EAA as from 2022 has remained a mirage in federal and
most state universities. In addition, the outstanding three and half months’ salaries
withheld during the preventable 2022 nationwide strike action remains unpaid to our
members in the federal universities. Similarly, our colleagues in many state universities
are being owed arrears of EAA, withheld salaries, third-party deductions and other
entitlements due to them. ASUU condemns this seeming disinterestedness of concerned
authorities about these issues of life and livelihood of our members across the
campuses. It will be unfortunate if the union is forced to take some unpleasant decisions
to address these lingering issues.

XI. The State of the Nation

Compatriots of the Press, the socio-economic crises in which our nation, Nigeria, is
currently engulfed are multifarious and multidimensional no thanks to the massive
injection of neo-liberal policies of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund.
In particular, the now famous “subsidy-is-gone” pronouncement of President Bola
Ahmed Tinubu at his inauguration and the floating of the US Dollar’s exchange rate
with Nigeria’s Naira have translated into hyper-inflation most noticeable in higher
commodity pricing, galloping transportation costs, unaffordable housing, rising costs of
public utilities including the banding, de-banding and re-banding of electricity tariffs,
and many more. The quality of lives of the ordinary Nigerians has precipitously
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declined, and the gap between the haves and the have-nots is daily expanding; the rich
continues to get stupendously richer while the poor are absolutely getting poorer. The
so-called middle class has since been wiped off by the increasing weight of dependants
in a society that prioritizes “palliatives” over and above the empowerment of the poor.
So, while the masses suffocate from the adverse consequences of the neoliberal socio-
economic policies of the government, members of the ruling class revel in questionable
wealth that makes nonsense of the anti-corruption crusade.

ASUU-NEC reviewed the invasive decline in the socio-economic lives of Nigerians and
noted the imploding consequences if the trend is not arrested. Nigerians can no longer
eat well or sleep well. And the pervasive poverty has entrenched a multidimensional
insecurity with the associated consequences. This is why the Government’s continued
foot-dragging over the living wage for Nigerian workers and sustainable empowerment
of poor Nigerians is an ill-wind that will blow no one any good. It is the considered
view of ASUU-NEC that the Federal Government of Nigeria should immediately
deploy the instrumentality of collective bargaining to conclude the social dialogue on
the new minimum wage for the country as a first step. Governments at the Federal,
State and council levels should also take a critical look at all unworkable policies and
programmes sponsored by the international money lenders such as the World Bank and
IMF with a view to reclaiming the country’s sovereignty and restoring the confidence of
Nigerians in their country.

Conclusion
Our dear compatriots of the Press, a number of issues on which ASUU has been
engaging owners of public universities (Federal and State Governments) in the last one
decade or so are yet to be meaningfully addressed. These include the sanctity of legally
constituted governing councils; review of the 2009 FGN-ASUU Agreement;
revitalization fund for public universities; earned academic allowances; and withheld
salaries, promotion arrears, and third-party deductions of our members. The others
issues are illegal recruitments; proliferation of public universities/abuse of universities’

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rules/processes; and treasury single account (TSA) and new IPPIS vis-à-vis the
autonomy of universities.

In view a critical review of the current state of affairs in our universities as well as in
our nation at the last meeting, the following major decisions were taken:
1. NEC condemns in strong terms the seeming refusal of federal and state
governments to decisively address all outstanding issues with the ASUU;
2. NEC rejects all the ongoing illegalities and flagrant violation of university
autonomy in public universities as a result of non-reinstatement/reconstitution
of Governing Councils; and
3. NEC shall reconvene after two weeks from the date of the NEC meeting to
review the situation and decide on the next line of action.

The struggle continues!

Thank you.

Emmanuel Osodeke
President

13th May, 2024

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