The Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU, has been accused of engaging in corrupt behavior by Nigeria’s President Muhammadu Buhari.
Since February 14, the union has been on strike in protest of demands related to lecturers’ pay and allowances. The president has appealed with the union on multiple occasions to end the strike, but the lecturers have refused.
ASUU is no less complicit in the corruption in tertiary education, according to President Buhari, who made the statement while formally opening the Fourth National Summit on Diminishing Corruption, which was organized by the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC), Office of Secretary to Government of the Federation (OSGF), and Joint Admission and Matriculation Board (JAMB).
While opponents belittle financing by focusing only on budgetary allocations, he claimed that corruption in the education system continues to harm investments, calling for a more thorough re-evaluation of expenditure.
“This year’s summit will reflect how corruption undercuts educational policy, investments, and creates a hostile learning environment for our young,” the president added.
“Incessant strikes especially by unions in the tertiary education often imply that government is grossly underfunding education, but I must say that corruption in the education system from basic level to the tertiary level has been undermining our investment in the sector and those who go on prolonged strikes on flimsy reasons are no less complicit.
“The 1999 Constitution places a premium on education by placing it on the Concurrent List, thereby laying the responsibilities of budgeting and underwriting qualitative education on both the Federal and State Governments.
“The total education budget for each year is therefore a reflection of both federal and state budgets and should be viewed as other financial commitments in their totality.
“The allocation to education in the federal budget should not be considered via allocation to the Federal Ministry of Education and also academic institutions alone, but should include allocation to the Universal Basic Education, transfers to TETFUND and refund from the Education Tax Pool Account to TETFUND.
“Corruption in the expenditure of internally generated revenue of tertiary institutions is a matter that has strangely not received the attention of stakeholders in tertiary education, including unions.
Meanwhile, Nigeria has commenced the process of deregistering the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), following the official registration of the Congress of Nigerian University Academics (CONUA), a breakaway faction of ASUU.