A former presidential aide, Senator Ita Enang, has urged the Federal Government to sue the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) for contempt over the union’s warning strike, which started on Monday.
Enang, a chieftain of the All Progressives Congress (APC), said this in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) yesterday in Abuja.
He argued that ASUU’s demand for unpaid salaries was in contravention of a court order obtained in 2023, which stated that the union was not entitled to salaries while on a strike.
Enang said: “They are going on strike to compel the Federal Government to disobey court order.
“If you want to go on strike, you have to agree that under the existing law, you have to forfeit your salaries for the period.
“In the United States (U.S.A.) and in the United Kingdom (UK), there is a Strike Fund, the money that the union pays members from during a strike because at such periods they are not entitled to salaries from their employers.
“My advice to ASUU is to call off the strike and go back to work while they continue with negotiations with the Federal Government.
“Innocent students’ academic calendar and life have been truncated and prejudiced.
“So, the academic staff union should know that those who want to go on strike should be prepared to lose their salary, according to the law.
“They should read the judgment, particularly paragraph two in that judgment. This is because one of the things we claimed in that judgment was that the period that the workers were on strike should not be counted.”
The former presidential aide stressed that all the issues raised by ASUU have been passionately addressed by the Ministry of Education and the Federal Government.
