ASUU Strike: Gbajabiamila Meets Buhari, Submits Report on House’ Interface With Striking Lecturers
By Deji Elumoye:
President Muhammadu Buhari Tuesday evening received the House of Representatives’ report on its intervention in the protracted strike by the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), promising to study and meet the legislators again.
Speaker of the House of Representatives, Hon Femi Gbajabiamila, who made this known while speaking with newsmen after meeting with the President at the State House, Abuja, also expressed hope after the meeting.
The Speaker who led the Hiuse leadership to the meeting said the President had received their report and requested for a few days to study it, adding that another meeting would be convened either Thursday or Friday.
According to him: “We came here for one reason and one reason only; after a series of engagements with ASUU and with people on the executive side, we’ve been able to come to some kind of decision, on our part, and recommendations to be made to Mr. President for his approval.
“That’s why we’re here because, as you know, what’s on the front burner today, beyond the politics, is our universities, our lectures, and our children who are out of school and the House of Representatives decided to step in at that point, four weeks ago.
“We’ve had a series of meetings that lasted hours and that’s… we came to discuss with Mr. President about those recommendations. That’s why we’re here.
“Mr. President, as usual, had a very good listening hear and he took the report of the House, accepted it, we discussed it at length, the details of the report, and he wanted to go through them himself and he’ll get back to us.
“We wil have another meeting on Thursday, between our good selves and Mr. President, for his final decision”, he said.
Asked if he thought there was any hope of succeeding, he said “oh, absolutely very hopeful. We had a good engagement, very positive response. He asked us a couple of questions in some grey areas, which we clarified and he accepted the report and he wanted a couple of days to go through it”.
On if House of Representatives had scheduled more meetings with ASUU, he said “no. We’re done with our meetings with ASUU. We’ve made our reports and we’ve done our recommendations.
“All that is left now, as we speak, is for us to come back here on Thursday, maybe Friday, I don’t know, in the next couple of days for Mr. President. He wants to digest the report in detail and we won’t know anything until Thursday or Friday”, he said.
House of Representatives had last Thursday met with the leadership of the striking ASUU and the representatives of the federal government in Abuja, with a view to ending the almost eight months-old industrial action.
