Memo to ASUU

Sallimichegani

You know there is cause for alarm when an event as momentous as a strike action by the almighty Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) is greeted by something close to a collective shrug of the shoulders by the general public. While it is a fact that no previous ASUU strike has ever won total public approval, the sheer vehemence with which opponents of the union’s tactics reacted was in itself ample indication that at least they cared. 

These days, one is not so sure. It is not as if people do not understand why ASUU is, yet again, up in arms. ASUU has made the case for increased funding for teaching and research and autonomy (the two cornerstones of its activism) so vigorously over the years that only a mischief maker would feign ignorance of the reasons behind its agitation.

 So the message is clear enough. Yet, there is a nonchalance among the general public that has deepened almost in inverse proportion to the increased clarity of the union’s campaign. ASUU may argue that it is the integrity of its cause, rather than the weight of public opinion, that matters, but the truth of the matter is that the union can ill afford a situation in which the rump of the public is either indifferent, or openly hostile.

Let me say right away that my observations here are made in a non-martial, even collegial, spirit. As a former member of ASUU and a diligent observer of dynamics in Nigerian universities, I am sufficiently aware of both ASUU’s history and the seriousness of the situation in the system to know that if ASUU is guilty of anything at all, it is that it is often apt to understate the depth of the decay on the campuses. 

Since its famous showdown with the Yakubu Gowon regime in 1973, ASUU has not relented in its efforts to create the right environment for scholarship in the university system. And since the ivory towers themselves do not exist in a social vacuum, and most of their problems are indeed emanations from a larger structural dysfunctionality, ASUU has had to forge alliances with extra-campus progressive forces with a view to restructuring the Nigerian state.

It is difficult to know precisely the extent to which these circumstances, and the fact that successive Nigerian governments have preferred to treat the universities like an extension of the civil service, may have dictated ASUU’s strategies and tactics. 

The unfortunate upshot however is that ASUU, rightly aggrieved by the Nigerian state’s serial infidelity, has frequently invoked the strike option, always as a final stratagem, and no doubt out of a sense of understandable frustration.

Nevertheless, ASUU must now begin to come to terms with the obvious fact that the strike option, while seemingly inescapable, has become tedious and counter-productive. It is not sufficient to argue that on every previous occasion when it has been used, it has ultimately had the desired effect of bringing the Federal Government back to the negotiation table, and wresting some gains, however modest, from its reluctant hands.

 I consider it insufficient because these short-term gains are being rapidly outdone by the long-term damage to the image and credibility of the union. 

I am by no means suggesting that the strike option be completely jettisoned; only that it be used more sparingly, and that ASUU challenge its rank and file to come up with more innovative methods to engage with regimes which see no reason whatsoever to make any sort of investment in the education sector.

Whether or not that is accomplished in the short or medium term, the uncomfortable truth is that there are other salient internal issues that demand ASUU’s urgent attention, and I imagine that the fact that these issues have not been addressed adequately is one reason behind the popular indifference that I mentioned earlier. 

And though none of these issues are by any means ASUU’s exclusive responsibility, the time has come for the union to be seen to accord them the attention they merit, if only to convince observers that it is aware of their existence. 

Arguably the most critical of theses issues is the quality of research conducted in our universities, and the merit structure within which such work is evaluated and remunerated. 

While ASUU may justly argue that that in itself is a consequence of decades of malevolent tinkering by successive military juntas, it does not completely exonerate it from the accusation that it could have done a whole lot better in tightening the process of admission into the professoriate. 

It does not speak well for the academia in general that it is increasingly seen as the final answer for those whose primary interest is not in research for its own sake and who are university teachers today because they found the door to the corporate world shut in their faces.

 Much more insidious than the brain drain which ASUU has rightly made its leitmotif is the current situation in which individuals are currently labeled academics, who ought to be serving the universities in non-academic capacities.

As I understand it, the situation I am describing is so grave that even if, by some miracle, ASUU’s demand that a certain percentage of the national budget be committed to university education were heeded, it is still not clear how the current rot in the system can be reversed without the kind of root and branch overhaul that must have to take with it a sizeable portion of the existing faculty. 

Thus, while proper and adequate funding is an issue, and ought to be pursued, it must be done with the understanding that it is in pursuance of a larger goal: the recuperation of the scholastic ethic which has been the single most important victim of nearly three decades of official neglect. 

ASUU must lead the inevitable purge that will see our universities regain their lost reputation as founts of intellectualism.