‘95% Of RSUST Lecturers Abandon Strike’

The Rivers State University of Science and Technology (RSUST) says 95 per cent of members of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) have resumed academic work in spite of the ongoing strike by the lecturers.

The university’s spokesman, Mr Desmond Wosu, told newsmen in an interview in Port Harcourt yesterday that ASUU had declared media war against the university.

He alleged that the union had resorted to portraying the university in a negative manner so as to publicly undermine its credibility.

Wosu was reacting to a call by the leadership of ASUU to set-up a panel of inquiry to establish the legality of the reappointment of Prof. Barineme Fakae as vice-chancellor.

He said the call by ASUU was regrettable, especially as Governor Chibuike Amaechi had encouraged the union to seek court redress, if it felt that the reappointment exercise lacked transparency.

“I think what the national leadership of ASUU should do is, if they want legal interpretation of what Governor Amaechi had done; is to go to a competent court of jurisdiction, instead of blackmail and campaign of calumny against Amaechi and the management of this university.

“For ASUU to continue to blackmail us and wage media war against this university is unfortunate because more than 95 per cent of academic staff have come back to work after realising that it was unnecessary for them to have embarked on the strike in the first place.

“We appeal to ASUU to shield their swords and prevail on its members, who are out there to come back to work because Amaechi performed his civic responsibility of appointing a vice-chancellor for this university.”

Wosu said the university would not be distracted by the union and as such, would continue to run its academic programmes in the interest of the people.

Reacting, the Chairman of the university branch of ASUU, Dr Felix Igwe,  said the union opted for a judicial commission of inquiry because of its transparency and speed in dispensation of justice.

He said that the university management was afraid of being confronted with facts, and as such, opted to deceive the public by carrying media propaganda against the union.

“We are a trade union and so, if we are protesting for something, it is for us to choose which method we are going to use to call attention to a protest.

“We are protesting against what they (university management) did, and they are now asking us to use their own method of finding solution to what we are protesting against.

“There is a legal way and also the trade union way of doing things; court alone is not the only solution to solving problems that have to do with industrial dispute as it is.

“In 2008, when the visitor (Amaechi) imposed the vice-chancellor (Fakae) on us by making him a substantive vice-chancellor after he had served for nine months as acting (VC); we protested and the visitor said the union could go to court.

“The visitor said that if you (ASUU) go to court; the case will be in court until I (Amaechi) finish my tenure and the vice-chancellor finishes his tenure.

“So ASUU went to Federal High court and the issue suffered 22 different adjournments and so it’s not as if the issue of court is not something that anybody can exploit; ASUU decides the best method of attending to its issues whenever it arises.”

Igwe also said that the university management was deceiving the public when it claimed that 95 per cent of striking lecturers had resumed academic activities.

According to him, the university is contradicting itself as the same university which is claiming that lecturers have resumed work; is asking the same lecturers to come back to work.

Our correspondent recalls that ASUU had on August, 2012, embarked on a strike over the reappointment of Prof Barineme Fakae as the institution’s vice-chancellor.