By Seyi Babalola
Representatives from the NigerianGovernment and the leadership of the Academic Staff Union of Universities, or ASUU, are meeting behind closed doors to negotiate outstanding concerns in order to avoid the union’s scheduled strike. The discussion began about 4.30 p.m. in the office of Prof Tahir Mamman, Minister of Education.
The Federal Government team includes the Minister of State for Education, Dr Yusuf Sununu, as well as other key Ministry officials.
ASUU President, Emmanuel Osodeke, who led the union’s delegation told newsmen that the meeting was to deliberate on lingering issues affecting the universities, in a bid to avert the planned strike.
“There are a lot of issues that are outstanding within the system and we believe that before now, they would have been taking care of.
“The issues would have been resolved in line with the promise made by President Bola Tinubu and that there will not be strike in the university system.
“We hope that this meeting will be able to resolve some of these issues so that we can move forward as a country as well as our university system,” he said.
Earlier, the Minister of Education, Mamman, said the meeting would provide an opportunity for both parties to rub minds on issues affecting the university system.
Mamman said that ASUU had earlier written to the Ministry, detailing a number of issues and concerns affecting the universities and the union.
He said that the issues required interactions between the union and government officials to possibly avert any strike proposed by the union.
NAN reports that the closed door meeting is still ongoing as at the time of filing this report.
ASUU had threatened to embark on a nationwide strike over the Federal Government’s failure to meet its demands.
The union had asked the government to meet the demands within two weeks.
