Nigerians React AS ASUU Extends Strike By 12 Weeks

Nigerians have expressed concern over the three months extension of the ongoing strike by the Academic Staff Union of Universities.

A statement signed by ASUU president, Prof. Emmanuel Osodeke, said the union decided to extend the strike action by 12 weeks to enable the government to effectively resolve pending issues.

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.”

Reacting to the development, some Nigerians through their social media accounts have lamented the continuous stall of the academic sector while calling on the government to speedily resolve issues with ASUU.

Human rights activist, Omoyele Sowore, who is also a former student union activist lamented over the continous silence of the Nigerian student body and called for immediate action from the student body.

“ASUU has extended strike by 12 weeks, before you know it, Nigerian students would have stayed home the entire year & the selfish elites quickly resolved and stopped airlines from shutting down services! It is time to act! Nigerian students, where art thou? #WeCantContinueLikeThis,” he charged.

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Also reacting through his Twitter handle, popular skitmaker and actor, Adebowale Adedayo known as Mr Macaroni said the future of the students is being jeopardised by political leaders who have shown no concern to the continuous plight of the Nigerian students.

He said, “It is absolutely insane that there hasn’t been any solution to the ASUU strike. Our so-called leaders are busy obtaining forms for the 2023 elections while the future of Nigerian students is at great risk. Everyone should be worried!”

A tweep, @HarunaNAbdullah, said, “Buhari and the two Ministers of Education do not care about the ASUU strike as their children are not schooling in Nigeria. The junior minister of education just bought the N100 million presidential form. This underlined the massive looting going on in the sector.”

A Facebook user, Chijioke Igbokwe, called on the affected students to protest against the development.

He said, “So the Nigerian students are waiting for us to come out and protest for them? Una go old for house. Most students now have degrees in social media advanced stupidity.”