The newly elected executive members of the National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS) on Sunday, September 18, met with the leadership of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) over the ongoing industrial action.
The students’ delegate led by its national President, Comrade Usman Umar Barambu, and the Secretary-General, Comrade Usman Baba Kankia in a statement issued after the meeting said they met with ASUU leadership in order to find a way forward on how the ongoing strike can be called off.
The students expressed satisfaction with the over 6 hours of meeting they had with the union, which according to the statement, had fruitful deliberations as ASUU President, Prof Emmanuel Osodeke intimated them on the various agreements the union had signed with the Nigerian Government and the terms of conditions laid before them to enable them to return to class.
NANS president also condemned the federal government’s nonchalant attitude in preventing the strike and allowing it to have lasted as long as 7 months, thereby crippling academic activities across the country.
He, however, appealed to ASUU to consider the pitiable state of the Nigerian students and their parents who have mainly been at the receiving end of the rift, and reconsider their stance on an indefinite strike, even though some of their demands are important and pivotal to the development of public institutions in the country.