The Academic Staff Union of Universities has debunked the trending claim of N1 trillion from the federal government. Says, “It’s not Correct”
The union president, Emmanuel Osodeke, who spoke to TheCable Lifestyle on Sunday, expressed concern that there has been little progress on the part of the government as regards its engagement with the union over the past couple of days.
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Asked about the rumours that fresh monetary demands were made by the union, Osodeke replied, said, “it’s not correct”.
“The outcome of that meeting was reported. Nobody mentioned N1 trillion. We don’t respond to all these rumours. What we’re demanding is coming after the government agreed to spend N1.3 trillion in 2009,” the ASUU president added.
“It was to be released N200 billion per year for five or six years. They didn’t do that which is what we’re asking for.”
Moyosore Ajao, the ASUU chairman at the University of Ilorin (UNILORIN), who also spoke on the matter, reiterated that the renegotiation of the salaries of lecturers has been an integral aspect of the union’s demands.
“That’s blackmail [to claim we made fresh demands]. We’re talking about outstanding debt needed to fund the system based on FG’s 2013 agreement. FG was supposed to pay N1.3 trillion to universities over six years,” he said.
“It was meant for the revitalisation of universities to bring our universities to be at par with global standards. This is an agreement of 2013 when the former president Goodluck Jonathan released N450 billion out of N1.3 billion.
“And so far, they have released about N50 billion to fund the entire university system.
