Jonathan to Buhari: I personally engaged ASUU leadership to end strike

Former President Goodluck Jonathan has counselled President Muhammadu Buhari how he engaged the leadership of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) to resolve a four-month-old industrial action in a day as President.

Jonathan said this in Abuja on Wednesday at the 70th birthday celebration of the Catholic Bishop of Sokoto Diocese, Matthew Hassan Kukah.

ASUU has been on strike since February 14 to press home its demands and accused the Federal Government of reneging on promise.

Jonathan said: “The society we are managing is complex, now we are talking about ASUU strike, during my time too, ASUU had four months of strike, different committees were meeting and meeting and nothing was working. I said how can our children stay out of school for four months? So I had to call a meeting of all the leadership of ASUU.

“I presided over the meeting with my Vice President, the Attorney General was there, I said that that night we must solve the problem.

“The Attorney General was there, Secretary to the Government of the Federation was there, the ministers of education were there, the labour ministers were there, the finance ministers, everybody that has to do with it.”

The former President added that the marathon meeting finally paid off due to his presence.

“And I thought that my being there would help us to do things quickly. But we spent the whole night, we finished at about 5:30 a.m. Before we concluded and the strike was called off, so there were issues,” Jonathan said.

The Star