Education Minister Tahir Mamman Meets ASUU To Avert Potential Strike, Forms Subcommittee For Resolution

Education Minister Tahir Mamman on Wednesday met the Academic Staff Union (ASUU) to prevent a potential strike the union had recently announced.

The minister said that he has created a subcommittee to review ASUU's demands and to work toward a lasting solution. ASUU had given the state and federal governments a 21-day deadline, starting from Aug. 22, to address their issues or face an indefinite strike.

The union is calling on the governments to resolve all the "outstanding issues" affecting the development of universities, noting that they last went on strike for eight months in 2022.

After the meeting, ASUU President Emmanuel Osodeke told journalists that he was hopeful the remaining issues will be resolved before the Sept. 6 meeting.

"We have met to discuss all the issues and review them. We have given the government between now and the pm meeting to see what they have done," Osodeke said, Premium Times reported. "We believe in the interest of the Nigerian child and to protect their interest if the issues are resolved."

Mamman and ASUU leaders reached a compromise in a closed-door meeting at the Federal Ministry of Education in Abuja, confirmed Folasade Boriowo, the ministry's spokesperson.

Boriowo said that both parties will meet again on Sept. 6 to continue their discussions, noting that Wednesday's meeting helped reduce the concern of another ASUU strike, which typically shut down Nigerian public universities.

The union urged the government to finalize and start implementing the renegotiated 2009 ASUU-Federal Government Agreement. They also criticized the ongoing use of the central payment system, the Integrated Personnel Payroll Information System (IPPIS), for paying their salaries.

Although Mamman stated in December that universities had been removed from the payment platform, ASUU claimed that its members were still being paid through a similar system they call "New IPPIS," which they reject.

ASUU in 2022 introduced its payment system, University Transparency and Accountability Solutions, which it developed for use in universities.

Last week, ASUU issued the federal and state governments a new 21-day deadline to meet its demands or face a nationwide strike. Osodeke strongly criticized both the federal and state governments for not addressing the issues raised by the union.

He also expressed dissatisfaction with the slow response from the minister of education in resolving these problems, adding that the union will meet again after the 21-day deadline to decide if further actions were needed.