ASUP TO RESUME NATIONWIDE STRIKE ON FRIDAY

The Academic Staff Union of Polytechnics is to
resume its suspended strike on Friday
following the
inability of the Federal Government to resolve
outstanding issues with the union. ASUP
Chairman,
Mr. Clement Chirman, told newsmen in Jos on
Sunday
that “the frustrating inertia of the Federal
Government to convincingly fulfil any part of
the
agreement reached with the union before the
suspension of the earlier strike on July 17,
2013
shows that government is not serious.”
Chirman said
that the ASUP’s National Executive Council
after its
75th meeting at the Federal Polytechnic, Bida,
Niger
State, resolved that the strike would be total
and
indefinite until the government showed
commitment
to honouring the agreement with the union. He
expressed dismay at government penchant for
breaking agreement, adding that “since the
union
suspended its earlier strike in July, government
has
shown no commitment to fulfilling any of the
promises it made to the union.” The union in
its
communiqué after the meeting in Bida decried
“the
anti-labour stance of the National Assembly
as
exemplified by the recently proposed removal
of
minimum wage from the exclusive legislative
list of
the constitution to the concurrent list, as well
as the
proposed legislation against declaration of
industrial
strike by unions in the tertiary sector.”