Since my last article under a similar headline to the one above appeared on Tuesday, I have received dozens of text messages and e-mails. A few of these mails were published on Sunday.
In the said article, I had argued that even though the Academic Staff Union of Universities had a strong case for calling its members out on a strike, the weapon had not only become ineffective, it was producing a damaging reverse impact. The very school system that ASUU is trying to save has become the worse for it.
The government’s shameful refusal to honour the 2001 agreement notwithstanding, I argued that ASUU must review its strategy or lose public understanding and respect. I offered four suggestions: publishing the names of public officials whose children are schooling abroad and the names of the schools; obtaining a court order compelling the government to honour its agreement; focusing the campaign on the passage of the autonomy bill; and/or picketing those directly in charge of taking action on the agreement.
The responses have been roughly in three categories – students, parents, and lecturers. While those in the first two groups – collateral casualties – seem to agree that the ongoing indefinite strike is one too many, a number of those in the third group think that my suggestions are useless at best, and at worst, very unfair to lecturers. I make no apologies. My conviction that there must be a way out, apart from strikes, was reinforced by the news last week that ASUU had threatened to disrupt the post-UME exam in some states. Of course, serious schools must begin to think of how to use technology to conduct future exams or to outsource them – with or without ASUU’s threat. Yet, I was horrified by the thought of angry ASUU members marching down the hallway to disturb candidates who could be their children from taking entrance exams!
But ASUU didn’t need to do that. By Monday, the non-teaching and senior staff unions had joined the strike, locking out children in primary and secondary schools attached to the universities. ASUU can, of course, argue that the threat to disrupt entrance exams and the ongoing strike are in the best interest of the system. What’s the use of fresh students when those already inside are facing an uncertain future? Good question. But then, if a strike was the best option, then we ought to have seen the result by now.
According to the National Universities Commission, public universities lost 36 months to strikes between 1993 and 2003. Between April and July 2006, ASUU went on strike for 10 days; and in 2007, academic activities were disrupted again by a three-month strike. The strikes have been mainly responsible for the outflow of students, forever changing the destinies of many of them. Student visa records from the British High Commission indicate a rising tide of Nigerian students. The number of students issued visas has grown from roughly 6,600 in 2005/2006 to 8,163 in 2007 and 10,090 in 2008. The flow to Ghana has become an avalanche, reaching about one quarter of the entire student population, according to a recent account by the high commissioner, Musiliu Obanikoro.
Yet, union leaders insist that nothing works better than strikes. Does it make sense for the entire university system, including those owned by states that have not breached any contractual obligations to lecturers, to be brought to a halt by the demands of a central union? I insist that it does not.
President Umaru Yar’Adua’s lethargy and pathetic indifference has contributed to the worsening of the current crisis: no less so have the cavalier attitude of the Education Minister, Sam Egwu; the obfuscation of the Minister of Information and Communications, Dora Akunyili; and the ineptitude of the legislature.
But can ASUU think outside the box? That is the challenge.
Re: Legitimacy, efficacy, and creative solutions
’Lai Olurode
In his weekly column of June 30, 2009, Azubuike Ishiekwene had interpreted the ongoing ASUU strike as an overkill, akin to killing a fly with a sledgehammer. Though, Azu, as he is popularly called, should be an ally of ASUU for several obvious reasons, this time, he has chosen to be detached. The three key words in my headline are from the write-up under reference. These three words are legitimacy, efficacy and creative solutions. Somehow, they should assist in providing a synopsis of his write-up. Azu’s main reservations could be summed up thus: Of course, strike is legitimate under our laws, but its efficacy is doubtful. He then wondered why the ivory tower is so completely devoid of people that could muster creative solutions.
My grouse with Azu’s belligerence over ASUU’s ongoing strike revolves around three main issues. First, tomorrow may not be adequately predicted from yesterday. Yes, strikes may have been used too often, but this ought not to impact negatively on their potency. Methodologically, causes and effects are more problematic in their relationships. There are a number of imponderables, indeed a couple of intervening variables, that can affect and direct the assumed, conventional and taken-for-granted causal relationships. Yet, strikes might not have been effective as a weapon of labour power in a military era, the same need not hold under democratisation. Besides, ASUU’s previous records and engagement with the state and its principal agents had produced outcomes that supported the effectiveness and potency of strike as a weapon through which improvement in tertiary education had been accomplished.
My second critique of Azu’s piece is in connection with the patent and inherent contradictions in the write-up. In one breath, Azu says “why is ASUU engaged in a gutter fight with a government that doesn’t know its own left from its right, and doesn’t even care?” So, to caricature Azu, since government is deaf and dumb, ASUU should just, in the language of Bola Ige of blessed memory, “siddon look” and probably go on vigils and engage prayer warriors. Then, all Nigerians should go on vacation and await God’s intervention. Azu and indeed Punch should stop publishing as previous writings and criticisms have not had any leverage on government businesses. Of course, this cannot be a strategy of dealing with our problems, since heaven helps those who help themselves.
This then leads me to the third and final point. Azu’s solutions in place of strike still imply reaching out to a government that doesn’t care – or one that is even incapable of caring. Azu had proposed three forms of responses from ASUU, which would be more efficacious. First, ASUU should publish names of key officials of government whose children are in foreign universities. Secondly, ASUU should push for the university autonomy bill in place of bread and butter issues. Thirdly, Azu urged ASUU to approach the courts for an order of mandamus and simultaneously picket chairs of education committees in the Senate and the House.
These responses can only be for a government and state actors that have a sense of morality and is perspicacious enough to discern and apprehend danger. In a country where politicians have no sense of shame; where politicians are mere prostitutes without any higher convictions that can dissuade them from jumping from one political party to the other; where political power is the ultimate; and where politicians are ready to strip themselves naked in public, then Azu’s solutions can be no solutions at all. We all owe our society an obligation to force change by whatever means possible.
Olurode is a Professor of Sociology, University of Lagos. He is on sabbatical at the Lagos State University.
The government’s shameful refusal to honour the 2001 agreement notwithstanding, I argued that ASUU must review its strategy or lose public understanding and respect. I offered four suggestions: publishing the names of public officials whose children are schooling abroad and the names of the schools; obtaining a court order compelling the government to honour its agreement; focusing the campaign on the passage of the autonomy bill; and/or picketing those directly in charge of taking action on the agreement.
The responses have been roughly in three categories – students, parents, and lecturers. While those in the first two groups – collateral casualties – seem to agree that the ongoing indefinite strike is one too many, a number of those in the third group think that my suggestions are useless at best, and at worst, very unfair to lecturers. I make no apologies. My conviction that there must be a way out, apart from strikes, was reinforced by the news last week that ASUU had threatened to disrupt the post-UME exam in some states. Of course, serious schools must begin to think of how to use technology to conduct future exams or to outsource them – with or without ASUU’s threat. Yet, I was horrified by the thought of angry ASUU members marching down the hallway to disturb candidates who could be their children from taking entrance exams!
But ASUU didn’t need to do that. By Monday, the non-teaching and senior staff unions had joined the strike, locking out children in primary and secondary schools attached to the universities. ASUU can, of course, argue that the threat to disrupt entrance exams and the ongoing strike are in the best interest of the system. What’s the use of fresh students when those already inside are facing an uncertain future? Good question. But then, if a strike was the best option, then we ought to have seen the result by now.
According to the National Universities Commission, public universities lost 36 months to strikes between 1993 and 2003. Between April and July 2006, ASUU went on strike for 10 days; and in 2007, academic activities were disrupted again by a three-month strike. The strikes have been mainly responsible for the outflow of students, forever changing the destinies of many of them. Student visa records from the British High Commission indicate a rising tide of Nigerian students. The number of students issued visas has grown from roughly 6,600 in 2005/2006 to 8,163 in 2007 and 10,090 in 2008. The flow to Ghana has become an avalanche, reaching about one quarter of the entire student population, according to a recent account by the high commissioner, Musiliu Obanikoro.
Yet, union leaders insist that nothing works better than strikes. Does it make sense for the entire university system, including those owned by states that have not breached any contractual obligations to lecturers, to be brought to a halt by the demands of a central union? I insist that it does not.
President Umaru Yar’Adua’s lethargy and pathetic indifference has contributed to the worsening of the current crisis: no less so have the cavalier attitude of the Education Minister, Sam Egwu; the obfuscation of the Minister of Information and Communications, Dora Akunyili; and the ineptitude of the legislature.
But can ASUU think outside the box? That is the challenge.
Re: Legitimacy, efficacy, and creative solutions
’Lai Olurode
In his weekly column of June 30, 2009, Azubuike Ishiekwene had interpreted the ongoing ASUU strike as an overkill, akin to killing a fly with a sledgehammer. Though, Azu, as he is popularly called, should be an ally of ASUU for several obvious reasons, this time, he has chosen to be detached. The three key words in my headline are from the write-up under reference. These three words are legitimacy, efficacy and creative solutions. Somehow, they should assist in providing a synopsis of his write-up. Azu’s main reservations could be summed up thus: Of course, strike is legitimate under our laws, but its efficacy is doubtful. He then wondered why the ivory tower is so completely devoid of people that could muster creative solutions.
My grouse with Azu’s belligerence over ASUU’s ongoing strike revolves around three main issues. First, tomorrow may not be adequately predicted from yesterday. Yes, strikes may have been used too often, but this ought not to impact negatively on their potency. Methodologically, causes and effects are more problematic in their relationships. There are a number of imponderables, indeed a couple of intervening variables, that can affect and direct the assumed, conventional and taken-for-granted causal relationships. Yet, strikes might not have been effective as a weapon of labour power in a military era, the same need not hold under democratisation. Besides, ASUU’s previous records and engagement with the state and its principal agents had produced outcomes that supported the effectiveness and potency of strike as a weapon through which improvement in tertiary education had been accomplished.
My second critique of Azu’s piece is in connection with the patent and inherent contradictions in the write-up. In one breath, Azu says “why is ASUU engaged in a gutter fight with a government that doesn’t know its own left from its right, and doesn’t even care?” So, to caricature Azu, since government is deaf and dumb, ASUU should just, in the language of Bola Ige of blessed memory, “siddon look” and probably go on vigils and engage prayer warriors. Then, all Nigerians should go on vacation and await God’s intervention. Azu and indeed Punch should stop publishing as previous writings and criticisms have not had any leverage on government businesses. Of course, this cannot be a strategy of dealing with our problems, since heaven helps those who help themselves.
This then leads me to the third and final point. Azu’s solutions in place of strike still imply reaching out to a government that doesn’t care – or one that is even incapable of caring. Azu had proposed three forms of responses from ASUU, which would be more efficacious. First, ASUU should publish names of key officials of government whose children are in foreign universities. Secondly, ASUU should push for the university autonomy bill in place of bread and butter issues. Thirdly, Azu urged ASUU to approach the courts for an order of mandamus and simultaneously picket chairs of education committees in the Senate and the House.
These responses can only be for a government and state actors that have a sense of morality and is perspicacious enough to discern and apprehend danger. In a country where politicians have no sense of shame; where politicians are mere prostitutes without any higher convictions that can dissuade them from jumping from one political party to the other; where political power is the ultimate; and where politicians are ready to strip themselves naked in public, then Azu’s solutions can be no solutions at all. We all owe our society an obligation to force change by whatever means possible.
Olurode is a Professor of Sociology, University of Lagos. He is on sabbatical at the Lagos State University.
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