The President of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), Prof. Emmanuel Osodeke, says the ongoing strike by the union will not end anytime soon.
The ASUU President made the comment on Wednesday while speaking on a Twitter space organised by Premium Times.
The union has been on strike since February 14 and the series of meeting with the government has failed to yield any positive results.
The most recent meeting on Tuesday has raised the hopes of many Nigerians after the union disclosed that the federal government has accepted to adopt the University Transparency Accountability Solution (UTAS) as the payment platform for lecturers.
Commenting on the meeting, Osodeke however said the government came “with nothing” to the table.
He noted that the government is yet to show any commitment to the demands of the lecturers.
“The situation now is that it’s even worse than when we started. The government has not shown any responsibility on how to fund our university system and education in general,” he said.
“They only claim they don’t have funds, no one can believe that. There are no funds and one man can steal N109 billion and the government is trying to negotiate with him? The government has not shown any commitment.
“We met with them yesterday and they came with nothing. It is very sad that all Nigerian universities are closed and all the government is interested in, is how to win elections and Nigerian people are watching.”
Speaking on why the strike lingers, the ASUU president said most Nigerian politicians are foreigners in the country and as such are not affected by the myriads of problems the country faces.
Osodeke said most of the politicians have their families abroad, where they have access to quality education and, as such, are not bothered about the plight of Nigerians.
“With all due respect, most Nigerian politicians are foreigners, their families live abroad, study abroad, all they do is come here, spend a few days, pick as much money and go back to ‘their countries’ to go and enjoy the money,” he said.
“There’s the issue of insecurity and all sort of things are happening in this country, the politicians are not bothered because they are not here.”
