By Tony Edike

ENUGU—THE Federal Government and the National Assembly have waded into the industrial dispute between governments of the South East states and the Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU, over non-implementation of the Federal Government and ASUU 2009 agreement which led to the three months old strike embarked upon by lecturers and other non-academic staff of the state-owned universities in the zone.

Lecturers in the universities owned by the five South East states commenced strike since July 22, following the refusal of the state governments to implement the agreement forcing the students to remain at home since then.

The leadership of ASUU at the national level last week directed academic staff of all universities across the country to proceed on three-day strike with effect from yesterday (October 11 to 13, 2010) in solidarity with the striking South-East lecturers and workers who had been out of their offices for about three months.

The governors of the South East zone had met twice to seek ways of resolving the industrial dispute but their efforts could not yield the desired result as they declined to implement the agreement on the excuse that their governments had no resources to pay the enhanced salaries and other benefits to the affected lecturers as approved in the said agreement.

Worried by the lingering industrial dispute in universities in the zone, the Federal Government, the leadership of the National Assembly and Federal Ministers from the zone met with the governors in Enugu, Sunday, night to seek possible means of resolving the dispute in order to reopen the institutions without further delay.

But after meeting behind closed doors for about four hours, the participants resolved to hold a larger meeting of the political leadership, elders, church leaders and other important interest groups from the zone to continue further dialogue on the issue.

Anambra State Governor and Chairman of South East Governors Forum, Mr. Peter Obi who read the resolution of the meeting said after a critical review of the prevailing situation, they resolved to convene a meeting of the interest groups on Sunday, October 17, 2010 at Nike Lake Resort, Enugu.

He said that those specifically invited to the proposed meeting include Governors of the zone, National Assembly members from the zone, Federal Ministers from the zone, Speakers of the State Houses of Assembly from the zone, leadership of Christian Association of Nigeria, CAN from the zone and Chairmen of the state Councils of Traditional Rulers.

Others are Pro-Chancellors and Vice_Chancellors of all the State Universities from the zone, Executives of the ASUU and Non Academic Staff Union, NASU of all the State Universities of the zone, representatives of the National Universities Commission, NUC, Presidents of Students Union Governments of all the State Universities in the zone and other stakeholders.

Speaking with reporters after the meeting, Deputy Senate President, Chief Ike Ekweremadu said the South East Caucus of the Senate at the National Assembly had after reviewing some of the issues referred to it including the closure of the universities and kidnapping in the zone resolved to take some steps to address them.

He said: “We took steps to intervene in the ongoing impasse between the South East Governors and the leadership of the Academic Staff Union of Universities. It was agreed in our meeting to go and meet the governors to find out what is going on and find a way of resolving the issue. So when I spoke with the leadership of the Governors’ Forum they were kind enough to invite me to their meeting today and I am happy that the step has been taken to convene a meeting of the larger stakeholders to resolve the issue because the major industry in the South East is education.

“We felt embarrassed that our children are out of school. I am happy that the governors are making efforts to ensure that this is settled. And one of the efforts is to agree to convene a meeting of larger stakeholders to find a way of resolving it so that the students will go back to school as soon as possible.”

Ekweremadu, however, commended the federal government for stepping into the embarrassing issue of kidnapping in Abia which affected other states of the South East, expressing happiness that normalcy is fast returning to Abia state.