‘It’s Too Late’: ASUU Rejects FG’s Appeal, Insists on Nationwide Strike October 13

The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) has rejected the Federal Government’s last-minute appeal to suspend its proposed warning strike, insisting that the industrial action will begin on October 13 as planned.

ASUU President, Chris Piwuna, stated this during an interview on Channels Television’s Morning Brief on Thursday, saying the government’s intervention came “a little too late.”

“The problem we have with this government and the leadership in the Ministry of Education is that they are slow — slow in responding to our demands,” Piwuna said.

He explained that despite several meetings and correspondences between the union and the Federal Ministry of Education, the government failed to act within the agreed timeline.

“They gave us three weeks. We went for a meeting in Sokoto at a time we were about to embark on the strike. We accepted their three-week request, but we never heard a word from them until the time elapsed,” he added.

Piwuna lamented that the government only reached out after ASUU threatened industrial action, describing the recurring pattern as evidence of the government’s insincerity toward addressing lecturers’ grievances.

This comes despite President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s directive to the Minister of Education, Prof. Tunji Alausa, to take “all necessary steps” to prevent another disruption in the nation’s tertiary institutions.

On Wednesday, Alausa announced that the Mahmud Yayale Ahmed-led Federal Government Tertiary Institutions Expanded Negotiation Committee had been reconstituted and inaugurated to fast-track negotiations with both academic and non-academic unions.

However, ASUU maintained that the move was merely reactive, emphasizing that its two-week warning strike would proceed unless the government immediately signs and implements the renegotiated 2009 ASUU-FGN Agreement.

The agreement includes provisions for the revitalisation of public universities, improved working conditions for lecturers, and the protection of university autonomy.

As of May 2025, ASUU had repeatedly warned of impending strike action, citing the government’s failure to honour these commitments. In August, members of the union staged nationwide protests across campuses to demand concrete action.