The federal government has finally announced the cancellation of a meeting rescheduled for today (Monday) with the leadership of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) over the on-going strike embarked upon by the university lecturers.
The meeting, convened by the Minister of Labour and Employment, Chris Ngige, to iron out some issues that had prolonged the strike, was earlier scheduled to hold last week but it was postponed following a misunderstanding between the parties.
The nine-month-old strike, which was compounded by the introduction of the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS), had paralysed academic activities in all public universities.
Charles Akpan, the spokesman of the Ministry of Labour and Employment, who disclosed the cancellation via a short message sent to our correspondent, did not state why the meeting was cancelled.
He wrote, “Good morning colleagues. Please note that the meeting with ASUU earlier scheduled for today is cancelled.”
It would be recalled that the government had during the November 27 meeting with the union, pledged to pay N40 billion as the Earned Allowance and N30bn for the revitalization of the university system bringing the total payment to N70 billion.