Dr Chris Ngige, the Minister, in a telephone interview on Sunday, said that the ministry had in April received the application from CONUA to be registered as a new union in the university.

He told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) that the application was awaiting deliberation as stipulated by Trade Union laws.

According to him, a committee will be set up to define modalities before it will be approved.

“They have not been registered yet. Their application is in the ministry. It has not been treated.

“We are still looking at their application. I asked a committee to look into it, when we look at the committee’s report, we will know what to do.

“They submitted it even before I left office initially, they submitted the application in April,” he said.

On whether CONUA would not duplicate the functions of ASUU, Ngige said that would be the duty of a committee set up on the matter to reveal.

The National Coordinator of CONUA, Niyi Ismaheel, said on Sunday in Abuja that CONUA had a sole purpose of redefining unionism and restore peace and stability in the universities in Nigeria.

NAN recalls that Ismaheel, while addressing journalists at the end of its first National Stakeholders’ Forum at the Obafemi Awolowo University, OAU Ile-Ife, said the union was formed with the goal to formulate a new approach of engagement in addressing the welfare of its members.

According to him, the union will help put to an end unnecessary delays in the academic calendar of Nigerian students, following frequent strikes.

“The Union, which started in OAU now has Ambrose Alli University, Ekpoma, Federal University, Oye Ekiti, Federal University, Lokoja and Kwara State University, Molete as members.

“The union is putting necessary documentations in place for official recognition by the university management and the government,” he said.

As at the time of filling this report, ASUU President, Prof. Biodun Ogunyemi had not responded to calls placed to his phones.

The post ASUU gets faction, Ngige confirms receipt of new application appeared first on New Mail Nigeria.

This naturally leads me to conclude that Sobowale’s problem is either the first fruits of the green-eyed demon most of us deny having ever met, or it is just plain spiritual. After all, we have all, at one point in time or another, attributed the unexplainable to that thing the Niger Deltans like to call, “home trouble”. Be that as it may, whatever we may decide to call Sobowale’s affliction, it is high time he sought help for it.

Last week, Dele Sobowale wrote an article titled, “ASUU and its Self-Made Problems”, to which he added a part 2 today, and as I read, I wondered how someone who claimed to be an economist, a columnist, a media and management research consultant would write such a piece for publishing and expect to be taken seriously. I shuddered as I read comments from Nigerians, some of whom Sobowale can father, teach this acclaimed consultant the way government works. Many kept repeating the phrase “government is a continuum”, something Sobowale himself should know and I smiled…the teacher has become the schooled.

We see that happen again and again with Sobowale. Ever so often, he crosses the line of logical reasoning and enters the realm of the ludicrous.

From my observation, there are two people for whom Sobowale often abandons all reason and spews sounds closer to gibberish than actual words that any reasoning being can make sense of. Wale Babalakin and Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala are two names that evoke such intense feelings in the heart of Dele Sobowale; the one he loves to protect, the other, he has clearly vowed to pull down. Imagine, then, Sobowale’s good fortune when he found an opportunity to achieve both in one fell swoop. This time, he takes out his frustrations on Okonjo-Iweala by blaming her for the lecturers’ strike because ASUU refused to enter negotiations with his beloved Babalakin.

I particularly found this excerpt from his article enlightening: “When the Honourable Minister of Education, Adamu Adamu, drafted Dr Wale Babalakin, SAN, to hold discussions with ASUU, two Mondays ago, he was turning to someone whose firm — Bi-Courtney — had claims of over N160 billion against the Federal Government which he was pursuing in Abuja that Monday. Yet, Adamu was also calling on the patriotism of Babalakin who had left an indelible mark at the University of Maiduguri as Chancellor and is embarking on more achievements at the University of Lagos. From information reaching me he has delivered all his services to the universities free of charge. There are only two business magnates known to me in Nigeria who can be so selfless as to abandon their own self-interest and attend to national interest so promptly – Alhaji Aliko Dangote and Mr Tony Elumelu. For Wale’s sake alone, ASUU should have temporarily shelved the strike”.

The way Sobowale deified Babalakin here is nothing if not pitiful, and his angst that Babalakin was not so honoured by others is evident in the rest of his article as he unleashes the full measure of his wrath on ASUU itself, on Mrs Okonjo-Iweala, and then on Goodluck Jonathan saying the strike was entirely their fault. I wonder if it is another Wale Babalakin Dele Sobowale is trying so hard to sell to us or the same one we all know? Anyway, that is another matter.

It is pathetic that a man of Sobowale’s claims seems not to be aware that the ASUU problem has existed in every administration, in one form or another, from time immemorial and the Jonathan administration inherited an agreement signed before its tenure. Why didn’t the GEJ government wash its hands off and cry foul that Yar’Adua or Obasanjo should be blamed for ASUU imbroglio it contended with during its reign?

It’s high time we stopped these emotional finger-pointing and get to work. The Buhari administration is getting on with its own version of the ASUU problem and they don’t need an apologist like Sobowale to speak for them or start to pinpoint guilty persons for that matter. As a matter of fact, Sobowale may not have formed this opinion if his dear Wale had not been shot down by ASUU.

Dele Sobowale has proved time and again that he is reduced to nothing more than a discredited commentator ready to blame Madam Iweala for everything and anything under the sun. Wale Babalakin failed in the assignment given to him by the education minister and suddenly, it is Okonjo-Iweala’s fault. Is it because she was one of the few people who would challenge his bogus and wrong economic opinions?

When a man like Dele Sobowale begins to act in a way that is irrational or we perceive to be contrary to the person we expect him to be, we wonder what ails him. Like I said earlier, I am no medical doctor, but I sure would like to know how he can be helped before he plunges himself so far down this pit that he becomes nothing more than the silliest of all jesters in the king’s court.

Asagbe, a brand consultant writes in from Ado-Ekiti

The post The Affliction of Dele Sobowale by Ebun Asagbe appeared first on New Mail Nigeria.

The association resolved to take this action after its national executive council meeting which ended in the early hours of Monday in Abuja.

Some of the demands of the association include the payment of the salary arrears of its members in federal and state health institutions and the upgrade of its members who have met the requisite criteria for promotion.

In July, NARD issued a warning to the government that it would embark on an indefinite strike if its demands were not met.

“Neither the federal nor state governments has shown commitment to the resolution of issues at stake nor honoured previous agreements,” Olusegun Olaopa, president of NARD University College Hospital, Ibadan, had said in a statement.

“Consequent upon this, the association resolved to proceed on a total indefinite industrial action from Monday, September 4, 2017, until all these issues are permanently resolved.

“Nationwide pre-strike protests against this injustice are to hold in all our branches and states of the federation on August 30, 2017.

“All heads of tertiary health institutions who have received funding for payments to our members should be directed to pay same immediately.”

The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) is currently on strike over the failure of the government to meet its demands, which include the payment of the earned allowances of its members.

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