By Peace O. Aboje
THE Joint Action Front (JAF) says it stands with the decision of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) to continue its six-month old industrial action, describing the government as insensitive and irresponsible to the demands of the union.
In a press statement on Friday, signed by Comrade Achike Chude and Comrade Abiodun Aremu, JAF’s Deputy Chairperson and Secretary, respectively, the civil society organisation frowned at government’s lack of concern and poor funding of the educational sector in the country.
JAF accused the government of continuously using the trade union of academics as a guinea pig in dismantling the rights of Nigerian workers to collective bargaining, stating that it has resolved to join forces with organised labour (NLC & TUC) towards organising a general warning strike.
“It is a germane to alert and avail the working people, youths and the oppressed poor across the country on the imperativeness of a national sense of memory by recalling what has been the stand and still the stand of ASUU in all negotiations and renegotiations of collective agreements with the FGN,” JAF said.
According to JAF, ASUU’s several strikes since 2013 are usually the result of the non-implementation of the FGN-ASUU Agreement of 2009.
The civil society organisation said, like ASUU, what it expects from the government is the implementation of all resolutions in the agreement signed by both parties and called on the government to honour the agreement signed.
It appealed to governments and parents to allow students organise themselves freely as the future of the country requires individuals who are confident about their ability to face the world and contribute their own quota to the building of the society.
JAF called on Nigerians to insist on the general strike stating that the class of looters in Nigeria is getting emboldened because there is no serious challenge to its reckless plundering of the wealth of the workers and the oppressed.
