In a bid to persuade the striking Academic Staff Union of Universities to end their seven months long strike, Pro Chancellors have urged President Muhammadu Buhari to back down from his no work, no pay stance.
This is stemming from the meeting the Pro-Chancellors of the Federal Universities held with the President on Friday at the State House, Abuja.
The Pro-Chancellors were led to the meeting by Prof. Nimi Briggs. He said they met Buhari in a bid to resolve the issue in his “as President and Commander-in-Chief, as father of the nation, and as Visitor to the Federal universities.”
He and his colleagues then urged the President to reconsider the no work no pay stance of the government promising that the striking lecturers will make up for the lost time.
He added that despite the pall cast by more than seven months of industrial action, “the future of the university system in the country is good”.
He cited as example the recent listing of the University of Ibadan among the first 1,000 universities in the world, a development occurring for the first time.
Minister of State for Education, Goodluck Opiah, said all the concessions made by Federal Government were to ensure that “the industrial action comes to an end, but ASUU has remained adamant.’’
