Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), has challenged Minister of State for for Education, Chukwuemeka Nwajiuba, to tell Nigerians from where and how he got the N100million with which he purchased the nomination form of the All Progressives Congress (APC) for the 2023 election.
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It will be recalled that the Minister, joined the list of his counterparts, including Minister of Transportation, Chibuike Amaechi and Minister of Labour and Employment, Chris Ngige to purchase the form last week, a development that has raised eyebrows in many quarters.
Joining in the fray, ASUU, argued that in serious climes, Nwajiba should be making some explanations to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) in charge of investigating financial crimes involving public office holders.
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ASUU, whose members have been on strike since February 14, 2022, without Nwajiba and Ngige, directly involved in negotiations to get them back to the classrooms, meeting a brickwall in their individual attempts.
Socrates Ebo, Chairman of the union at the Federal University, Otuoke, Bayelsa State, told reporters in the in Yenagoa, the state capital, declared the decision of the two Ministers as a shame.
His words: “It is a shame that a serving junior Minister of education will boldly declare that he is starving university lecturers all over the nation for daring to ask that the education system in the country be improved. Truly, you can’t shame the shameless. Since when has demanding for the improvement of education in the country become an offence? This is a very sad low in the annals of our country. Indeed, charlatans have taken charge of our affairs.
“The Minister of Education should be educated that lecturers’ duties include: community service, teaching and research. As we speak, lecturers all over the country are engaged in research and community service.
“The strike is a last resort in the attempt to make a reason-deaf government to improve facilities in our public universities, pay lecturers a living wage and stop the frittering away of the nation’s dwindling resources through IPPIS. What part of this demand is crime?
“The Minister who is putting up a show of pretending to attempt to lead the country should rather tell Nigerians how he came by a whooping sum of N100million to purchase his party’s nomination form when his legitimate salary is less than a million naira in a month.
“If this were a serious country, he should be making some explanations to ICPC and EFCC by now. Unfortunately, we are in a season of absurdities. Those who previously declared that no serious government would ever allow lecturers to go on strike are now not only forcing lecturers into strike but are also starving them on top of that. What an irony of history! It is well with Nigeria!”
