ASUU: Ojukwu University Factions Disagree On Strike
Factions of Ojukwu University disagree with each other over strike.
Two factions of the Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU chapter of Chukwuemeka Odimegwu Ojukwu, University, COOU have disagreed with each other over the impending strike of the union.
While one faction is in favour of the strike, the other is against. The latter wants to join the strike while the former wants to separate from the strike.
In separate congresses held on Tuesday in the university, the two factions led by their separate leaders made their reasons known to newsmen.
The Deputy Vice Chancellor of COOU and leader of one faction, Professor Osita Chiaghanam on his part said that the Aniebo faction was only aimed at truncating the university’s industrial harmony and disrupting the school’s academic calendar, if they should embark on strike.
The other faction led by Prof. Okey Aniebo who was in favour of the university joining the strike said that there was no reason for the university not to join the national union in the upcoming strike since the varsity was underfunded by the government. He made it known that if not for the TETFund and Needs Assessment Funds, that the university would not be existing, which the two funds were a result of ASUU’s struggles in the past.
Aniebo also said that some ASUU members who participated in the union’s previous strike action are still being owed up to four months salaries by the university management despite the no-victimisation policy.
“As you have witnessed, agents of the Vice Chancellor for the second time have disrupted our lawful meeting at the Union’s Secretariat, our members are intimidated into not joining our meetings.
“Poor funding has not been adequately addressed at the Federal level while state owned universities like COOU have been abandoned at the mercy of the TETFund and NEEDS Assessment Intervention funds.
“As a tradition of our great Union, this press conference is an early warning shot that we are reluctantly being driven to the point of entering another vicious cycle barely one year since the last traumatic experience,” Aniebo said.
