ASUU strike: Wike shuns journalists after secret meeting with Union, stakeholders

In a continued effort to resolve the ongoing face-off between the Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU, and the federal government, an emergency meeting was on Tuesday held between the Supervising Minister of Education, Mr. Nyesom Wike, and the Union.

It was reported that nothing tangible was gathered regarding the outcome of the meeting that lasted for only one hour.

Attempts to speak with the ASUU President, Dr. Nasir Fagge and the Minister failed, as both of them refused to disclose the outcome of the meeting to journalists.

The ASUU Head only responded after series of questions that, “I am not in a position to talk.”

Apart from the Minister and the ASUU chairman, the Executive Secretary of the National Universities Commission, Prof. Julius Okojie; the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Ibadan, Prof. Isaac Adewole and a few other national officers of the union were equally at the meeting.

Relatively, Vice-President Namadi Sambo had a brief meeting with stakeholders in the nation’s education sector on Tuesday.

No details of the meeting’s outcome were made available to journalist as none of the members agreed to speak to the press.

The stakeholders were led to the Presidential Villa by Wike and other members of the delegation, including Okojie and Adewole.

Some members had earlier told journalists who were waiting outside the venue that the Minister would address them, but Wike did not respond to questions when he came out of the Vice President’s office.

ASUU has remained on strike for nearly four months, in protest of the Federal government’s failure to implement the 2009 agreement it signed with the Nigerian government. It has said that until hundred per cent of the said agreement is implemented, the nation’s universities would remain shut.