Foundation Defends Striking Varsity Lecturers, Faults Govt

An acquisition advocator and laminitis of the Onono Onimisi Foundation (OOF), Onono Onimisi Rafatu, has defended the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), insisting that the union’s agitations are driven by a combat for dignity and amended education, not for comfort.

Rafatu, successful a connection titled “ASUU and Government: Who to Blame?” yesterday, faulted the national government’s handling of ongoing negotiations with the lecturers’ union.
She accused the authorities of consistently undermining the acquisition assemblage done neglect and mediocre funding.

According to her, “ASUU’s combat has ne'er been astir comfort. It is simply a outcry for respect, for amended funding, and for a strategy that values acquisition with the aforesaid urgency it gives to politics.”
She argued that the government, not the lecturers, should carnivore the blasted for the recurring concern crises successful Nigerian universities.

“Let’s beryllium honest, the existent culprits present are not the lecturers but the government—the aforesaid strategy that underfunds education, delays salaries, and pays articulator work to reform,” she said.

Rafatu described lecturers arsenic unsung heroes who proceed to service nether harsh conditions portion striving to animate anticipation among students contempt the government’s nonaccomplishment to prioritise education.

“Our lecturers are not the enemies. They are the ones who people scripts precocious into the night, study to people adjacent erstwhile their pockets are dry, and inactive effort to animate anticipation successful a decaying system,” she stated.
She added that ASUU’s agitation was astir ensuring that the adjacent procreation learns successful an situation that rewards excellence, not endurance.

“Before you constituent fingers oregon disregard their demands, instrumentality a infinitesimal to reflect. Spend conscionable 2 weeks teaching without pay, without recognition, and without support. Only past volition you recognize the value ASUU carries,” Rafatu wrote.

She urged the nationalist to spot ASUU’s conflict arsenic a telephone for justness and reform, not disruption, stressing that “the existent question isn’t ‘Why is ASUU ever fighting?’ but ‘Why does the authorities ever springiness them a crushed to?’”

According to her, until the authorities fulfils its promises and honours agreements, assemblage acquisition successful Nigeria would proceed to endure setbacks caused by neglect and indifference.