Academic Strike: Colleges Of Education Academic Staff Union Begins Today
The Colleges of Education Academic Staff Union (COEASU) today embarked on a one-month strike.
The decision of the union to begin the strike was reached after they had a meeting at the Federal College of Education (Technical), Asaba, Delta State. This is coming after the 21-day ultimatum issued by the Union to the federal government in May 2022 ended.
The Union had complained about the neglect of issues affecting colleges of education by the government, and the unfair treatment of the union members. Some of these issues include the IPPIS, non-release of the pledged revitalization fund pegged at N15 billion, and the failure of the government to continue the renegotiation of the COEASU-FGN 2010 Agreement among many other issues.
The meeting which the Union held on Friday, the 10th of June was to assess the response of the federal government to its requests, after which the union agreed to embark on the strike.
In a statement signed by the COSEAU President, Dr. Smart Olugbeko, and General Secretary, Dr. Ahmed Lawan, the Union informs that the strike action which was suspended in 2018 will be resumed for four weeks after which the NEC (National Executive Council) of the Union would reconvene to assess the government’s response and make further decisions.
The statement issued directed all the chapter congress across the nation to convene on June 14 Tuesday to adequately inform the congress of the beginning of the strike action.
The statement informs that the strike would be total and comprehensive and instructs all academic staff in Colleges of Education across the country, both federal and state-owned to adhere to the strike action.
This is coming in with the prolonged strike of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), as well as other Unions in the Nation’s universities. The strike which started on February 14th, 2022 has only seen extension instead of resolution.
Just last month, the Academic staff of Polytechnics in the country called off their strike in waiting for the federal government’s response.