Education: Don tasks Tinubu to end incessant strikes

By IGE ADEKUNLE


OGUN- The Vice-Chancellor of Trinity University, Lagos, Prof. Charles Ayo, has advised the President-elect, Sen. Bola Tinubu, to develop a robust education system to end incessant strikes in tertiary institutions.

Ayo, also the former Vice-Chancellor of Covenant University, Ota, gave the advice while speaking with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Friday in Sango-Ota.

He was reacting to Tinubu’s acceptance speech after being declared as the winner of presidential election by INEC.

NAN recalls that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) on Tuesday night declared Tinubu as the winner of the Presidential election held on Feb. 25.

According to him, no nation will be able to develop without a robust educational system to back up its national development.

He commended Tinubu for the proposed plan to grant universities autonomy and education loans to students, as these have never happened before in the country’s education system.

Ayo said that granting autonomy to universities was a good step because the money you paid at University of Ibadan would not be the same with the one paid at University of Lagos.

He added that each university would be purely responsible for the management of their resources as well as remunerations is concerned.

“Why on earth then will the University go on strike for resources,” adding that they will get enough money to grow at their own pace, he said.

The vice-chancellor said that students whose parents could not afford private universities would be able to do so with the introduction of the proposed education loan by the incoming government.

Ayo said that the decision was a welcome development as this would put an end to incessant cases of lecturers embarking on strikes in the tertiary institutions.

“There wouldn’t have been an end to incessant strikes embarked by Academic Union of Universities (ASUU) if proactive steps are not taken towards meeting their needs,” he said

He noted that one of the reasons why ASUU always embarked on strike, apart from fighting for an improved welfare, was due to non-availability of resources for them to teach.

Ayo said that from 2019 to date, the nation’s universities had been shut down more than five times.

This, he said, was impacting negatively on the parents and students, noting that the country needs new approach in solving strikes problem.

The vice-chancellor added that the normal method or approach of going on strike was not working in addressing conflicts in our institutions. (NAN)