 Labor set for nationwide protest over closure of universities while the federal government declares solidarity protest illegal and we take a closer look at the 2023 governorship election as political parties prepare to battle for the soul of Lagos State. Well this is Plus Politics, I am Mary Anna Cohn. Barring any last-minute change of mind, Nigeria Labor Congress will this week embark on a nationwide protest in solidarity with the academic staff union of universities ASU which has been on strike for more than six months, forcing students to stay at home endlessly. Meanwhile some sister Walker's union have declared their solidarity with the striking textury education union saying that they will fully participate in the protest and may even join the strike to show their disappointment and displeasure against the federal government for allowing the country's public textury education to be closed down for this long. Well joining us to discuss this is Dr. Austin Sado. He is a former ASU chairman, University of Port Hacke-Branch and also joining us is Unye Kakaris, he's the Assistant General Secretary, NLC. Thank you so much gentlemen for joining us. Thank you very much. Thank you. I'm gonna start with you Mr. Sado because you know this is the you are the primary guys who have been on strike and this is because you're still trying to get government to the negotiation table. Now within the past few days we've seen the president go from saying well we need this to be handed over to the Minister of Education as opposed to the Minister for Labor Chris and Gigi interfacing with Labor. But then since that message from Mr. President was put out what's changes has there been has there been any moves that one way or the other looks like things might change for the better because I also hear that there's some universities who are withdrawing from the strike and saying that they're going back to classrooms. But thank you very much. As far as I know nothing has changed and as a matter of fact the directive by the president so that was the news that broke on that Tuesday last week that the president had given directive but the the spokesman to the president came out two days or so later on to see there was no such directive that the Minister of Education Mala Adamu Adamu asked for two or three weeks to resolve this on pass and then I actually imagine that whatever the case is the next thing would be to have a treatment with the union towards the revolution of this on pass. As far as I know there is no meeting that has been between as the team and government since that Tuesday and maybe there are things in the works that it is I mean you see how well you see how I'm a whole seven days and for from the way I perceive and understand the situation and clearly I just believe that if government wants to resolve this conflict that one day or two days will be enough. So I think we are still in time and I hope that we will have that opportunity to have this resolve and put it behind us. But with regards to the point you raised about some universities pulling out I am not aware of anyone. I remember that the Minister of Labor Dr. Kucingbege had alleged that the University of Dakota precisely that the medical school of the University of South Dakota had waited to say the word more of a strike and that they were working and they had graduated students. But for those who understand the working of the university system you will understand the fact that until the senate of the university approves the result a degree result or whatever result it is not a result. So when the Minister of Labor claimed that a university medical school had graduated students only that minister they were able to tell the Italians what that meant and how that will achieve. But to the best of my knowledge the University that has opted out of its strike and as you can see from the comment of support across the nation almost every person that is on the side of the ordinary people the poor people of this country amongst them no matter what you think about it across any any demarcation imaginary things created by companies. I mean support from you that once and for all let us deal with these issues and for that reason I do not imagine that any university lecturer who thoroughly understands the reason we have been under strike we have opted out. I'm going to come back to you because there are certain things I need you to break down for me as per ASU but let me go to Mr. Yica Chris. Mr. Chris you are of labor and many would say that this does not concern labor but then it's argued it could be argued that it affects all of us and at some point the minister had said that labor getting involved in this is political. He said that over and over again and I'm wondering why did labor take so long to take interest I mean it's been six weeks six months I beg your pardon. Why didn't this impress upon labor when it was three months or two months? Why now? I think there was a minister of labor. The minister of labor was doing that too much. I'm saying that the Nigerian labor company does not have any business getting involved in the potential of the ASU. One, they are at a union in an affiliate of the Nigerian labor company and so what so ever affects ASU and their membership affects the Nigerian labor company and I'm sure that the minister of labor who in his registry has done it by the affiliates of the United States understands that they are not and understand our responsibility to the ASU. That is one. Two, what so ever affects any section of the Nigerian society also has the capacity to affect Nigerian workers and affect all Nigeria wherever they may be. It is also our responsibility to ensure good governance and what we are calling a technical command to impact the lives of Nigerians wherever they may be of our children at home. It is not just that the Nigerian Congress will be threatened but also every Nigerian, every Nigerian must be threatened. It is certainly for the government to say things like this. It shows that they want, they do not want the Nigerian people to engage, to engage with the and ask the questions pertaining to where they have been governed this nation. Now you ask the question, why is it that it has taken on so long? That is not up on the truth. We have started engaging the federal government from the what goes. We have heard meetings on this issue. We have heard meetings with ASU on this issue. They have briefed out Nigerian Congress has written letters to the federal government on this issue. We have excised for four seconds in this past six months trying to make the federal government to see reasons, to ensure that they implement agreements that they have reached with ASU. We do not understand why the federal government will be led on agreements that they were not forced to reach and we believe to see a height of zero sustainability on the part of the party to reach agreement with another and define not only the main thing and so the Nigerian Congress after so much pain and all that is where the strength has felt that it is now time for us to take action that will be more visible and that is why the next national election of the Congress has decided that a month is a month and that we are going to impact, remember, not a strike but a protest rally to express our discontent about other what is going on in Nigeria. I'm curious to I mean I'm not in any way saying that you know embarking on a protest is a bad thing but I'm wondering ASU has been on strike for six months a very long time that's almost a whole school year now you're embarking on a protest that ASU is okay what do you think that this will do if ASU has been on strike for six months and now you're going on a protest what exactly do you think that what effect will it you know make on the government? I don't think that you are listening to me what I said is very clear that we have been engaged in government and the ASU, my brother the former ASU chairman would tell you that we are engaged in government on this matter we are intervening from the point that ASU is on strike, not even this strike, the former strike, so we have been engaged but because the size of the change that is why it has taken this long, we have less than one minute. Okay let me let me go back to Mr Sada, Mr Sada I'm going to ask the same question I ask, yes ASU has given a nod to the United Labour to be part of this process meaning that ASU will be also on the road tomorrow protesting but I ask again I mean I'm sure that you're trying to get something from the federal government but if they have not reacted in six months what will the protest of two days do to them? Well thank you very much, I mean it's only reasonable to say that if you have been pushing for five months that this strike has been on and abuse and means which ASU alluded have not made government to do what is expected of it and taking the temporary lead to be higher will definitely have some results. You can imagine if the appeal of the New Year level congress was just to let's even be a symbolic terminus rally and it is covered and the entire world is watching to see that the reason this protest of rally is going on is because the government of Nigeria had neglected education or university system for five months. I mean it is not a good story to tell about any government so we hope that government will think twice if I were one of the advisers of government since NLC gave this ultimatum I would have done everything before today to make sure that that rally didn't take place. But I believe that if it's allowed to take place because ASU should be by its cast as I can imagine and I think the best they can do is to just find a way beyond tomorrow to arrest the situation. So the government does not think twice about its neglect of the system after this protest then we really need to ask government the question what does the government of Nigeria want with the university public university system in this country? Does the government actually want to destroy completely so that their friends who own private universities will prosper there in Himalayan the rest of us to death because I do not imagine that any person who is having what they call the minimum wage or even those of course there's no middle class anymore so I do not imagine how many Nigerians who are able to send their children to private universities or to send them universities abroad so it's clearly it won't be the policy of government that they want to diverse completely they want to destroy public university and except that is the truth there is no reason government should not react positively to this protest and the expectation is that the governments that things of the people the welfare of each citizen a government that thinks about the development of the country must take education seriously and they don't have to wait for a protest like this to happen before they take action. I think there is two in two weeks already in the day five months down the line and it will not be a sad commentary we allow this to freshen a bit beyond the terribly bit that we're talking about now so I think it's up to government and honestly speaking men of good will also direct this question to government what do you want the people to do before you have a priority reaction to the legitimate struggle that these people are having on behalf of the masses of this country? Conflict only can answer that question. Interesting I also want to go comment you from a different direction now there are those who would say that maybe it's high time that Nigerian universities become self-funded like universities abroad I mean I always ask the question if that were to be the case would we see the education system better for it or maybe we haven't even gotten to the part where we can actually say that Nigerian universities can stand alone being that now it looks like every state has to have a university for political reasons. I actually think more people got this impression that autonomy in the university would mean self-financing it doesn't happen anyway in the world and I don't know where they're taking their model from if it's in the Americas you still have public universities in the United Kingdom you have public universities in Germany you have public universities everywhere in the other countries you have public universities so government funds, government funds education and it is the responsibility of government to ensure that access is given to these citizens to have quality education. So wherever this narrative is coming that people talk about oh if it's self-sustaining I do not know what it means. To me self-sustaining means that governments will have ejected reasonable funds into the university by weighing on grants to the universities and in governments that are interested in it and giving the status of economy the quest to even improve on research laboratories you do not understand you do you want to where is the fund going to call for individuals to drive their research in order to maybe have potency or to you know be innovative in one way or the other that will get going to the university we are still struggling with just the minimum benchmark in our education system so I don't know where people got that impression from universities the popular ones you talk about in Cambridge and Oxford the all the other private universities they are they receive grants from government and so if we want to live alone we must if we want to have a sustainable funding in education government must have a revenue but the second level rate is that if you do not have a conducive environment for knowledge production you are not likely going to have people come from outside the university in many of those places that people talk about fund and not talk about independence people go from other other other countries to those places and pay they just have paid help to me in neighboring countries and that will help to sustain but to do that you must make sure that you are brought to a university to point where it is attractive how many foreign and Saudi universities are lecturers how many foreign and Saudi universities are students so these are issues that you must consider before you talk about self-sustained funding but autonomy will be not actually mean self-funding all right let me go back to Mr Chris Mr Chris let's talk about the labor again and the solidarity rally which you know will happen tomorrow like you said it's tagged the solidarity rally there are also those who are wondering why labor is not protesting about the fact that you know we have the electricity grid that has collapsed over and over again the cost of leaving which is rising high the bakers who have said that they're going to down tools the hike in fuel price I mean the list is endless we have our plate pretty full and just like Mr Sado says is look it looks like the middle class is fading out because you know times are tough will this be part of your rally will this be part of the agenda the conversations that will be had what you will be pushing for or is it just in solidarity of ask yes we know that education or the future of Nigeria is hanging in the balance it's very reliant on the kind of education that we have today but are we seeing labor pushing for other things other than this the price of petroleum products were hiked by the federal government and the tariff on electricity and they will ask you why is it that you are going only on strike on this why can't you engage on that thing we see we are being engaged in on all of these issues but at this particular point in time what we are concerned most about now for this already is on the issue our I have three of them two of them a final in 50 years they are looking at me I have another one that is here to be looking at me so many people have all of these all over the nation and it's important to look up to not only the children but only to our nation and to our economies so we believe that we must have to engage in the same way we are engaging other things well unfortunately I think that we're being caught up there but quickly I want to say thank you Mr Austin Sadow is the former asset chairman for University of Port Hacot branch and I think Chris is the assistant general secretary of the NLC I'm wishing you good luck gentlemen as you go on your rally tomorrow hopefully something great comes out of it thank you so much for being part of the conversation well we'll take a quick break when we come back we'll be talking with the politician in the studio as of course the big guys who are all throwing their hats into the ring and of course fighting for the soul of Lagos battling we want to find out is it a three horse race or is it a four horse race we'll be right back after this break