The National President of the Academic Staff Union of Polytechnics (ASUP), Anderson Eziebe, has blamed the federal government for the incessant strikes by unions in higher institutions in the country.
Eziebe stated this while briefing journalists yesterday during his familiarity and sensitisation visit to the ASUP members at the Federal Polytechnic, Damaturu.
He said the unions resort to strikes when government fails to honour its agreement with them.
“So if the union will respect agreements, why will the government not respect agreements signed into with the union? So as a matter of fact, we felt the government is not leading us in the right direction in this aspect because the government should lead by example,” he said.
Ezeibe said some significant objectives had been achieved during the recently concluded two weeks strike by the union as four out of the eight outstanding items were met.
“Agreements that were achieved include: arrears of minimum wage has been paid and discrepancies that have been arising have been handled from institution to institution basis.
“Government is progressing in addressing the problem of those that were omitted or underpaid and four policies instruments for institution management and accreditation have been approved among others.”