Students’ hopes of resuming their studies in Nigerian university campuses this week were temporarily dashed yesterday when the Academic Staff Union of Universities’ (ASUU) National Executive Committee  [NEC] directed its chapters in Federal and state universities to hold  meetings from today to deliberate on a tentative deal reached between government and its leaders at the weekend. The deal may however bring to an end the total strike action embarked upon by the union since June this year. The various chapters will make their views known on the tentative agreement, after which ASUU’s NEC would meet, probably later this week, to decide on whether to end or continue with the strike action.

The decision to commit the matter to the various branches was taken at an emergency NEC meeting at the University of Abuja campus, which began at 9pm on Monday and ended at 6am yesterday.

Speaking to reporters after the meeting, NEC member and Chairman of ASUU, University of Abuja Chapter Dr. Abdul Mallam said the leadership briefed NEC on the situation on ground and it was agreed to take the matter to the various congresses.

“Yes, the principal officers reported to us on what recently happened between them and Governor Oshiomhole and the Minister for Education with the NLC as witnesses. Our NEC eventually resolved to go back to our congresses and report to them for congresses to advise us on what to do next.”

Asked if the congresses will be voting to resolve the matter, Mallam said, “No. the issue is going to be discussed by the various congresses and when it comes to the issue of discussion, you don’t just go and start voting. The issues are there in black and white. Congresses would be briefed on the issues so that congress will take a well informed position.”

He said only the congresses can decide on the next step to take with regards to either continuing or calling off the strike and he refused to comment on when the congresses will reach a decision.  

“That is certainly beyond NEC. It is the congresses that will determine that. NEC has been informed and it will go back to the congresses for further advice,” he said.

The latest agreement, sources within ASUU told Daily Trust, was hammered out over several weeks with the intervention of Nigeria Labour Congress [NLC] president Abdulwaheed Omar, Speaker of the House of Representatives Dimeji Bankole and Permanent Secretary in the Federal Education Ministry Professor Oladapo Afolabi, himself a former ASUU member. The source said Edo State Governor Adams Oshiomhole only came in at a later date “and hijacked the whole thing, much to the annoyance of ASUU leaders.”

Among the deals reached in the tentative agreement, according to informed sources, was government’s agreement to sign a central agreement with ASUU “in line with the principles of collective bargaining.” This has been one of the major issues at stake over the months, with government saying ASUU chapters should negotiate and sign deals with respective university governing councils in the spirit of autonomy.

Daily Trust learnt that another area of disagreement, the objection by state governments that the Federal Government should not commit them to an agreement, was papered over with ASUU’s insistence that the current deal awaiting signature by the two parties does not violate the 1999 Constitution, as state governments allege. Specifically, state governments argue Section 6 of the unsigned agreement hammered out by Chief Gamaliel Onosode’s committee violates their constitutional autonomy.

ASUU however insisted that the provision only provides for minimum standards for anyone who wishes to won a university in Nigeria, Federal, state or private. The tentative deal now before the ASUU chapters also contains no agreement on pay package, with ASUU rejecting government’s “of-the-table offer” of a 40 percent pay hike, which is less than what the Onosode committee hammered out. ASUU said the earlier recommendation is the minimum required for university academic departments to be able to retain in their service students who obtain First Class and Second Class Upper degrees.

Negotiations between ASUU and the Federal Government broke down in August, but Daily Trust learnt that even before Governor Oshiomhole recently waded in to broker a tentative deal, several persons were working behind the scenes to bring the two sides together.

Last Saturday, Governor Oshiomhole and Minister of Education Dr. Sam Egwu as well as ASUU resolved that the union should call a NEC meeting within three days and possibly suspend the strike within the week for negotiations to commence on matters within the earlier agreement. They also said once that was done, a final deal could be concluded within a week.  

At the joint press briefing, Oshiomhole said “we have resumed discussion since last week on the ongoing dispute between Federal Government and ASUU. We have made a lot of progress because Mr. President wants this negotiation to be concluded and he has given us all the support that we require. We have had exhaustive discussion with both parties and all the key issues have been very well taken care of with both coming into an understanding. We are expecting ASUU as a democratic organization to call its National Executive Council meeting to consider the possibility of suspending the strike so that negotiation can start.”

He said “both parties, to demonstrate their seriousness, agreed that once ASUU returns to the classroom, all other issues will be resolved within a short time, not more than a week, so that university system will return to normalcy.”

ASUU President Comrade Ukachukwu Awuzie on his part advised government to also reach out to the other unions so as to bring a lasting peace to the system. He said, “As he said, in ASUU we have procedures. Whatever we have looked at will be properly presented to the National Executive Council of ASUU. They will consider the presentations and we do hope they will take informed decision.”

 Even though yesterday’s NEC meeting did not fix a date when it would reconvene to receive reports from its branches, a senior official told Daily Trust that this could be done within a few days, “before the end of this week.”