ASUU and the Politics of the Stomach

ASUU and the Politics of the Stomach

Jideofor Adibe

The current strike by the Academic Staff Union of Universities has been a source of concern to many Nigerians. The strike, which began on June 24, 2009 was triggered by what ASUU said was a refusal by the government to endorse a 2006 agreement that would, among other things, devote 26 percent of annual budgets to the education sector as well as implement a new salary structure requiring a budget of some N78 billion Naira. The Non-Academic Staff Union and the Senior Staff Association of Universities have since joined the strike, grounding the country’s public universities to a halt.

The strike and the government’s response to it raise a number of issues.

One, is that by allowing the university teachers to embark on an indefinite strike before opening any serious dialogue with their union, an erroneous impression is created that the government is impervious to dialogue and negotiations and that the only language it understands is strong-arm tactics – militancy in the Niger Delta or paralysing strike by ASUU and other organised labour. Therefore a major lesson from the strike is the yawning absence of any institutionalised mechanism for industrial arbitration in the country. The government appeared even confused over which of its ministries – the Ministry of Education or the Ministry of Labour - should negotiate with ASUU. Not only is it embarrassing that a government cannot be trusted to keep its words, the lack of an institutionalised mechanism for dealing with the incessant labour disputes in Nigeria is worrying.

Second, is that while there are sympathies for ASUU over the government’s shabby handling of the situation, the lecturers, by their incessant strikes that frequently disrupt the academic calendar, are now seen as part of the problems of higher education in the country. Since its formation in 1978, ASUU has had running battles with every government of the day, mostly over bread-and-butter issues that are conveniently camouflaged under the veneer of fighting for better funding for education. Their analyses of the problems of the education sector, including their conditions of service, sometimes seem to gloss over the fact that many of the identified problems are merely symptoms of an underdeveloped economy, and not problems that are unique to the education sector. It is for instance not only University lecturers that are underpaid and work in adverse conditions – virtually all workers in the public sector such as the police, the army, primary and secondary school teachers and doctors - face similar challenges. Therefore focusing exclusively on the problems in the education sector in isolation of the general challenges in the other sectors of the economy will only give a distorted picture of reality. Take for instance the 2006 agreement, which required that 26 percent of annual budgets be devoted to the education sector. How realistic is this in the face of competing demands for the country’s dwindling revenue? It is instructive to note that the highest allocation to the education sector in modern times was the 11 percent allocated to it under General Abdulsalami Alhaji Abubakar’s regime (June 9, 1998 – May 29, 1999). This is however not to suggest that the 2.2 percent allocation in the current budget is acceptable. While no one doubts that education is the future and should be adequately funded within the limits of available resources, to ask for 26 percent allocation to the sector is simply unrealistic.

Three, while the conditions under which our lecturers work are unacceptable, what is also urgently required is for ASUU to be more pro-active in coming up with alternative sources of funding for universities to augment the allocations from the federal government. We need for instance to know why most of our universities have been unable to successfully embark on commercially viable activities such as consultancies or to serve as incubators for certain types of businesses. We will equally like to know how many companies have been spun-off by our universities as some of their counterparts in the West do? In this respect, there could be a need for an annual league table, where universities and the various courses they offer are ranked, with part of the funds allocated to universities based on their ranks in the league table and the research output of their academic staff. On emoluments, universities should have the right to fix the salaries of their staff based on their revenues. They should also have the right to disengage academics who are no longer productive. We should reject the current situation where there are lecturers who have neither published any scholarly work nor attended any major conference in the last five years. We must have the courage to decide whether the ivory tower is the right place for such ex-intellectuals.

Four, rewards and obligations should go together. Just as the lecturers make legitimate demands on the government as their employers, the government seems to have failed - as far as PR is concerned – to also make public demands on the lecturers to fulfil the obligations of their employment. There is for instance a need for the government to articulate the minimum obligations expected of the lecturers, including demonstrable teaching or research abilities and avoiding actions that could lead to disruptions of the school calendar. It may be wise for lecturers in each university to be balloted before a strike action such that if a minimum number of votes were not secured, the strike would be deemed illegal. The government should also take a firmer look at some of the contradictions within the ivory tower itself including corruption, sexual harassment and moonlighting.

Five, there is currently no disincentive for a strike action in the country. The government for instance does not seem to be interested in preventing strikes apparently because the children of the top government functionaries do not attend these public universities. The lecturers on their own appear to be prime beneficiaries of these strikes as they not only get paid for not working but also will have more time for their moonlighting activities during strikes. In this regard, the government should consider setting up industrial arbitration courts or tribunals, which should adjudicate on all labour disputes, including those between ASUU and the government. Decisions by these tribunals should be binding on both the labour unions and the government. Such arbitration tribunals will not only help to reduce the incidence of strikes but will also curtail the tendency for the successful resolution of one strike to trigger another ‘me-too’ strike action by another labour union eager to win its own concessions because as they say, any behaviour that is rewarded has a tendency to be repeated.

Jideofor Adibe is editor of the multidisciplinary journal, African Renaissance and publisher of the London-based Adonis & Abbey Publishers Ltd (www.adonis-abbey.com).