The Nigerian Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers (NUPENG) has said it will go on a solidarity strike with the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), if the Federal Government does not comply with the agreement it signed with the lecturers’ union.
NUPENG accused the government of being insensitive to the plight of Nigerians.
It noted that the way the government has been acting on the ASUU strike portrayed it as unconcerned about the nation’s suffering.
NUPENG’s National President Igwe Achese spoke at the weekend in Lagos when he announced the union’s delegates’ conference which will hold on October 17 in Port Harcourt, the Rivers State capital.
Achese noted that the “nation’s foundation is shaking because our future leaders and their children are not attending our local universities”.
According to him, the Federal Government owes it as a duty to end the strike.
The union leader urged the government to respect the agreement it signed with ASUU in 2009, adding that the government should see itself as an employer of labour.
He said: “It is particularly shocking that the government has carried on as if everything is normal, without bothering about the fate of the students who have been marooned at home since the strike started. Perhaps this is because the children and wards of those at the helm of affairs are luxuriating in schools abroad, or because they are too comfortable to worry about their less-fortunate compatriots.”
Achese attributed the incessant strikes in the country to the fact that the Ministry of Labour had not been performing its duties.
Source: The Nation
