ASUU President: "We Can't Get to Work Because We Can't Afford Transportation costs

Prof. Emmanuel Osodeke, President of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), has warned that his organization's members may have trouble getting to campus on Monday due to a lack of "money for transport."

On Sunday's episode of Channels Television's Sunday Politics, he made the announcement while discussing issues related to the strike's suspension by the ASUU.

Most institutions are unable to offer housing for professors, so Prof. Osodeke stated, and gone are the days when professors lived in staff quarters near campuses.

He noted that teachers would have trouble affording transportation to their classrooms if they had not been paid for eight months.

Nowadays many professors live twenty or thirty kilometers from their offices, whereas in the past all professors lived on campus and students could walk to class. How are they going to afford the cost of getting to and from work?

These are the problems we're likely to run across, and the departments responsible for fixing them. While we negotiate other problems, we expect the government to pay the money [eight months salary arrers] so that these people can return to work.

When asked if the strike had been called off, he confirmed it, saying, "We suspended the strike hoping that the government will do the needful and by tomorrow, if the universities are open, maybe the teachers will go back to work."

Since the concerns have not been entirely resolved and no agreement has been reached, we are returning to work in accordance with a ruling from the relevant industrial court.

The Speaker [of the House of Representatives, Femi Gbajabiamila] has agreed to intervene, and we are hopeful that with his help we can find a solution to this issue quickly.

To paraphrase one of our professors, "Our professors will teach, but you can't expect someone who is due eight months' salary, maybe from his bank, he has collected more than N1m as a loan and you haven't given him one kobo and you want him to attend to class and teach.

I hope they make the journey for the sake of the kids and give it their all while they're there. A hungry man is not likely to have an open mind at school.