THE striking Academic Staff Union of Universities has expressed hope that their meeting with President Goodluck Jonathan tomorrow will bring mutually acceptable solution to the four months old strike which has paralysed the nation’s university education.

The Speaker of the House of Representatives, Aminu Tambuwal, Thursday declared that the Parliament was ready to amend any portion of the nation’s law to grant any request of appropriations from the Executive Arm of Government to accommodate the demands and end the lingering strike of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU).

The face-off between striking university lecturers and the Federal Government entered a new phase, yesterday, as some lecturers took to the streets with both parties engaging in war of words. While the Federal Government accused members of ASUU of being heartless for the prolonged strike, the lecturers tackled President Goodluck Jonathan on his appeal to them to be patriotic enough and call off the strike.

The Education Rights Campaign (ERC) has said that it welcomes the decision of three trade unions – the Nigerian Union of Teachers (NUT), the National Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers (NUPENG) and the National Union of Electricity Employees (NUEE) – to embark on solidarity strike actions to compel the Federal Government to honour agreements signed with the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU).

Members of the Academic Staff Union of Universities have been called upon to allow thousands of students roaming the streets to return their schools so that the union will not lose the sympathy of Nigerians.

The National Association of Nigerian Students has disowned the over 3-month old strike action embarked upon by the Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU.

The twist in the relationship between the students union and the university lecturers was sequel to a position paper by the students’ body that viewed certain demands by ASUU as contained in 2009 deal, as “unrealistic and un -implementable”

As if some other unions buy this principle of the power of democracy, the idea of solidarity action is gaining ground by the day on the ASUU issue. Already, 2 other powerful unions are warming up to join the strike. The Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers (NUPENG) was the first to show concern.

Nwadila Chukwuemeka Wogu, the Minister of Labour and Productivity has had a challenging but made phenomenal strides in his beat since his appointment in April 2010. In this interview, he articulates the challenges he has faced, how President Goodluck Jonathan has quietly motivated the Nigerian working class and how the counsels from his elders at home led by Governor Theodore Orji have kept him on course.

THERE is a paradox governments have built around education — they are spending billions of Naira on education, yet the financial issues around education are not being resolved. The Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU, strike is only one of many matters that are dogging education.

CHINUA Achebe in his book, There Was A Country , wrote: ” Why has the war not been discussed, or taught to the young, over 40 years after its end?’ History, we were taught, is the story of past events.