• Education sector can’t progress when ASUU goes on six-month strike, says Nwajiuba

• Nigerian lecturers least paid globally, FG not serious about knowledge economy – ASUU

Friday Olokor and Grace Edema

The Federal Government on Wednesday lambasted the Academic Staff Union Universities for refusing to call off its six-month strike.

The Minister of State for Education, Chukwuemeka Nwajiuba, in an interview with The PUNCH in Abuja, said the bulk of education budget was being spent on 10,500 professors in Nigeria’s public universities.

Faulting ASUU’s request for more funds, the minister said the union should realise that no sector in the country was getting enough money.

He also said the union’s penchant for strike was driving public school students abroad and to private universities.

Following their disagreement with the Federal Government over non-implementation of 2009 agreements and opposition to the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System, which government insisted all workers must adopt, the lecturers on March 23 began an indefinite strike.

On Friday, the Federal Government directed all educational institutions to resume on Monday next week as the spread of COVID-19, which necessitated the shutting down of the schools had reduced.

But on Monday, the President of ASUU, Prof Biodun Ogunyemi, told The PUNCH that no member of the union would resume because they could not work on an empty stomach.

In the interview with The PUNCH, the minister of state for education said ASUU could not blame government for not running universities well, saying the institutions were run by the union members.

According to him, the bulk of the money that is being budgeted for education is paid to the 10,500 professors, out of the 71,000 lecturers in Nigeria.

He said, “Actually, there have been a lot of people asking me as minister what I think is the real intention of ASUU. If you look at it critically, what ASUU is achieving by this (strike) is driving students to private universities and out of the country.

“There is nothing that is now an issue. Even if you say universities are not well run, it is ASUU members that run them. If you say there is no enough money given to education, there is no enough money given to anything in Nigeria.

“The bulk of the money that is in education is paid to these professors. There are 71,000 lecturers in Nigeria alone, with 10,500 of them as professors. There are some countries that don’t have up to 2000 (professors).”

“So, it is not enough to simply say we should bring more money; from where? The 2020 budget, underperformed as low as 62 per cent. We didn’t even collect revenue, there were no companies functioning to pay taxes.”

Although the minister said the bulk of education budget was being spent on university professors, he did not specify the amount being spent on the payment of the academics.

However, in 2018, the Federal Government budgeted N605.8bn for education, while in 2019, N620.5bn was allocated for the sector. In 2020, N671.1bn was earmarked for education.

Berating the union further, Nwajiuba said ASUU should cooperate with government and other Nigerians to fix the economy.

According to him, Nigeria is not inventing anything. He added that everybody depended on revenue from 1.5 million barrels of crude oil produced by the country.

He stated, “Not that Nigeria is inventing anything. Everybody is waiting for these 1.5 million barrels of crude oil. They sell them and they become the source of revenue for everybody; the source of dollars and the source of buying new cars.

“A country like Saudi Arabia with less than 25 million people will sell 12 million barrels of oil. Nigeria will sell 10 per cent of that with three times the population. So, it’s a management issue. People should agree to cut their coat according to their cloth. What we are trying to do in the education sector is to manage it.

“I’m not saying things can’t be better, but all of us have to work towards improving that and the way to improve is not by being on strike for six months and chopping (sic) the rest of the money for other people.”

The President of ASUU, in his response to the minister, wondered if government did not want lecturers to be paid.

Ogunyemi was reacting to the minister’s statement that the bulk of education budget was being used to pay professors.

He asked, “ Is he saying that lecturers should not be paid. If he thinks education is expensive, he should try ignorance.

“I don’t know what that means. You think because you are paying lecturers, that’s where your bulk of money is going. How much are they paying those in the CBN (Central Bank of Nigeria) and the NNPC (Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation)? I don’t think it is something we should argue about.

“The truth is that everywhere you have seen innovation, invention and development, they invested in education and still investing in education. If any government official thinks that because they are investing in education, they should make life difficult for university lecturers, then they are preparing the ground for the collapse of the country.”

He stated, “You see what happened during the COVID-19 pandemic. We didn’t have molecular laboratories. We didn’t have facilities that could empower Nigerian scientists to make meaningful intervention.

“In some cases, we had to use the contributions of our members to start producing hand sanitisers. Some of our branches actually used their own resources to develop sanitisers and dispensers.

“I wouldn’t understand the context which he said they were paying lecturers too much, when Nigerian lectures are actually the least paid in the whole world.”

“All over the world, the in-thing now is knowledge economy. How do you achieve knowledge economy when you don’t make facilities available to empower those that are making sacrifices to ensure that Nigeria could be counted among the leading nations in the world.”

He also berated the minister for condemning the union’s strike. He asked, “What of government’s penchant for not honouring agreements? These other places they are talking about, people will talk of Ghana and Benin Republic as abroad, are those places abroad? Members of the ruling class have made it impossible for us to achieve steady development in the education sector because they don’t have commitment.”

Ogunyemi also denied allegations that the lecturers were spending money meant for others.

https://punchng.com/bulk-of-education-budget-spent-on-public-varsities-10500-profs-fg/

Govt that means well for the future must budget more for education sector. That is the simple truth.

Budget more for education. Because our profs are still much underpaid.

PROFESSORS IN TITLE. PEOPLE THAT HAVE BEEN USING GENERATION TO GENERATION TOPICS TO TEACH STUDENTS

Boys don dey turn to men at home

Enough of this ASUU and FG failed agreement and deliberation, both are to be blame, everybody for their own selfish interest. Meanwhile FG advised ASUU to consider farming

Fvck all of you. Nigeria na scam, if u get money make sure u japa comot no allow ur children come suffer for this useless country

I heard that in the news this morning. The so called professors that can't invent or innovate, always fighting for money and writing journals....shior.

What of the money Jonathan pumped in Universities? They have embezzled all.

This country ehn?...

Fvck y'all

No money spent on education is actually a waste. Plz government should help us give sadist prof sack letter .

#Discontinue Nigeria

it seems the more money we pump into education, the lesser the outcome.

we don't see good result after all these spending, it's like that all over the world, technology innovation has stalled, it is globalization that is at full throttle.

globalization is not technology, globalization is just copying what worked somewhere,

example is how china is copying the west, it's globalization

billion are pumped into research worldwide yet the result is absent. if there was technological innovation, by now stem cell transplant would be realistic, hiv can be easily cured, immortality would be realistic by now.

why have we stopped innovating
we used to see more innovation in the 1940 now we are halted because of the big research institute, that are engaged in fraudulent research.

Nice move

Yes. Just as bulk of Nigerian Annual Budget is spent on 469 legislators in Nigeria.

True

Two greedy party


ASUU and FG would never reach compromise

Sai baba

4+4

Unproductive 'armchair' professors for that matter.

na wa ooo

Useless old prof doing nothing & earning fat salary

What are the professors professing

Lie from the pit of hell....Less than 500k salary is what this man is talking about? So a Prof should be paid lesser??

Kai, who did this to Nwajubia?

Why's he not allowing the minister do all the talking rather he is being used as the fall guy... I give up on Southern Nigeria... Dumb

Please sack all these Professors and disolve ASUU

They are a bug to the Average Nigerian students

Smh. Their kids ALL school overseas. The truth is they don't care.

Nigerian students, if you like support them, it's your LOSS.

Lol.....why not increase the budget to include infrastructures for universities as well....do you need logo flyer and banners for your business contact me now...I will do a perfect job for u..

xcellentgraphic:
Lol.....why not increase the budget to include infrastructures for universities as well....do you need logo flyer and banners for your business contact me now...I will do a perfect job for u..

That's what a sensible govt should do. Prioritise education, health, key sectors.

The fvck

Niggarr!!


This comparisons with Saudi to justify incompetence is very saddening.

Nigeria is fvcked.

I just discovered that SK cures malaria.

I have to get into more research into that shit.

#Peace out