ASUU has been on a nationwide strike
since July 1.
The Academic Staff Union of Universities
(ASUU) has said that no fewer than 50
letters were written between 2011 and
2012 to the presidency to avert the ongoing
strike.
ASUU president, Nasir Fagge, who was
represented by, Olorunyomi Oju, a don,
disclosed this at the 2013 World Human
Rights Day celebration on Tuesday in
Osogbo.
The occasion, which was organised by the
Osun Civil Societies Coalition, was attended
by representatives of government and
human rights groups.
He said that in spite of the efforts made by
the union to resolve the issue of the 2009
agreement between it and the Federal
Government, there was no response to its
letters.
He decried the allocation of 8.9 per cent of
the country’s budget to education as against
31 per cent Ghana commits to the same
sector.
The ASUU leader called for more attention to
be given to education to address the myriad
of challenges in the sector, especially the
decay in education infrastructure.
Mr. Fagge, who lamented that the union had
been on strike for the past five months in
order to re-position education, noted that
“education is a human right and not a
privilege”.
He said that education remained the right of
every child and should not be delayed for
any reason.
In a lecture, Yinka Muyiwa, a legal
practitioner, said “government whether
federal or state has the primary
responsibility of making economic and
social rights of the people a reality.’’
The lecture was titled; “The Economic and
Social Rights of Nigerians: The Need for
Conscious Revival.”