The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) has expressed hope that the new agreement it signed with the Federal Government will prevent strikes for at least three years.

The two parties on Wednesday signed and unveiled a new agreement aimed at improving the quality of the university education system and ensuring stability.

Over the years, ASUU has repeatedly gone on strike to demand increased funding for public universities, better welfare for lecturers, and full enforcement of previous agreements.

Speaking on Channels Television’s The Morning Brief programme on Thursday, the President of ASUU, Prof. Chris Piwuna, said that if properly implemented, the new agreement could prevent frequent strikes.

“There are measurable aspects of the agreement, and we believe we can monitor it that way,” Prof. Piwuna said on the breakfast programme.

“If we monitor it, we can raise concerns before it gets to a head, and we hope that in three years’ time there will be no strike at all until this agreement is reviewed again.”

The ASUU president said the new agreement incorporates an Implementation Monitoring Team, which will be domiciled at the National Universities Commission (NUC) and coordinated by the office of the Executive Secretary of the NUC.

According to him, the committee will continue to monitor the agreement to ensure that the pact between the parties is always respected and properly followed up.

Prof. Piwuna confirmed that the 2009 agreement, which had sparked multiple strikes over unresolved issues, has now been replaced by the new pact.

He stated that all references for implementation by the union will now be made from the new 2025 agreement unveiled yesterday.

“It is believed that we now have the 2025 agreement; all references will be made to the 2025 agreement. The 2009 agreement is no longer what we will refer to, but there are aspects of the 1992 agreement signed by Professor Attahiru Jega that we still refer to as a guide to understand why we are where we are—it is history,” he said.

“So, 2009 is history, and we will continue to refer to our history so that we are properly guided. But for implementation, there is really nothing in the 2009 agreement that we are going to implement; it will be the 2025 agreement.” (Channels)

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