ZONAL PROTEST IN CALABAR HOLDS TUESDAY, AUGUST 27TH 2013!

 FG & State Governments Must IMPLEMENT AGREEMENTS with ASUU, NASU, SSANU, NAAT, ASUP, SSANIP, COEASU, SSUCOEN & NUT!!!

EDUCATION IS A RIGHT! SYSTEM CHANGE IS OUR GOAL!!

  PRESS STATEMENT

1.     The vehicle to ensure that EDUCATION IS A RIGHT in a polity where the Government is irresponsible to the needs of the people is MASS ACTION. In line with this, JAF, in furtherance of its resolve to mobilize stakeholders in the Education sector across the country will hold a Zonal Protest in Calabar on Tuesday, August 27^th at the FREEDOM (Botanical Garden) PARK, Mary Slessor Road @ 8am. Zonal Rallies in other zones and states such as Kano, Ibadan, Owerri, Port Harcourt, Abuja are to follow. The rallies/procession are buildup towards a NATIONWIDE MASS PROTEST that will become inevitable should the Government remains insensitive.

2.     We urge Nigerians to organise and mobilize at all levels to SAVE PUBLIC EDUCATION by joining the Mass Rallies/procession.

FG’s CURRENT DIVERSIONARY ANTICS ON THE AGREEMENT IT REACHED WITH ASUU

3.     The latest disinformation by the Federal Government (FG) on its readiness to release N130bn to meet the ASUU demands should be disregarded in the light of the following FACT.

4.     The FG‘s plot is to deceive the public that it is offering ASUU a lifeline (or intervention fund). This is not correct because ASUU is not making any FRESH DEMANDS. ASUU is simply demanding that the FG should implement to the latter the terms of the 2009 Agreement, viz.

·In 2001, the FG entered into an agreement with ASUU aimed at resuscitating the University System in Nigeria and saving the system from total collapse. The Agreement provides for re-negotiation every three years for impact assessment and its implementation.

· The Agreement was due for re-negotiation in 2004 but the FG reneged. Re-negotiation didn’t take place until 2007 and it lasted more than two years to produce the 2009 Agreement, which the FG is refusing to implement.

·The contents of the 2009 Agreement were: Funding, Review of laws that impinge on university autonomy, Earned allowances to entitled academic staff, etc.

· On Funding, the FG AGREED with ASUU that the sum of One trillion, five hundred and eighteen billion, three hundred and thirty one million, five hundred and forty five thousand three hundred and four naira (N1,518,331,545,304:00) would be required in three years and distributed as follows: 2009 (N472,031,575,919), 2010 (N497,531,778,701) & 2011 (N548,768,190,681).

·To provide the Fund (N1,518,331,545,304:00) as agreed, the FG was to ensure that (a) a minimum of 26% of the annual budget is allocated to education. Other funding sources identified were Education Tax Fund, Petroleum Technology Development Fund (PTDF), Patronage of University Services, Funds from Alumni Associations, Private Sector Contributions, etc.

·As at date, JAF makes bold to state that the FG has refused to IMPLEMENT the Agreement, whose funding component ought to have been concluded in 2011. Instead, what the FG tries to smartly cover up and deceive the general public, in the guise of Government’s being BROKE, is to provide N100bn out of the agreed N1.518trillion. The other N30bn the FG said it has also approved is said to be for the earned allowances of N92bn it owed. This is the fallacy of the N130bn the FG claimed it has approved for immediate release.

·The general public should know that the N92bn in question is the legitimately earned allowances of academic and non-academic staff for three and half years.

·It is equally important to state that Funds are never released to ASUU or any of the other unions in the education sector. Funds are directly released to the management of the various institutions. The issue therefore should be clear that Government should IMPLEMENT the agreement.

FG IS NOT BROKE!

5.     It is important for JAF to state clearly that the FG is not broke. The import of the Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of all Ministers – Mrs. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala’s statement is that the FG is irresponsible to Education and social welfare of Nigerians but it is not broke to pay IMF and World Bank hundreds of billions annually to service external debt.

• The FG is BROKE because Mrs. Iweala is playing the script of the IMF and World Bank to facilitate the looting of Nigerian resources into the coffer of foreign capital. It is an agenda that was pioneered by the Obasanjo military regime in 1978 when the first JUMBO LOAN was taken to put Nigeria into the club of debt enslavement.
• The FG was not BROKE for Mrs. Iweala to facilitate the “ACT TO AUTHORISE THE ISSUE FROM THE TIIE CONSOLIDATED REVENUE OF THE FEDERATION THE TOTAL SUM OF (N1,612,000,000,000.00) ONE TRILLION, SIX HUNDRED AND TWELVE BILLION NAIRA OR EQUIVALENT TO (US $12,400,000,000.00) TWELVE BILLION, FOUR HUNDRED MILLION DOLLARS ONLY FOR PAYMENT OF OUTSTANDING DEBT OWED TO THE PARIS CLUB OF CREDITORS through the 2006 ACT No. 5 dated  17th Day of December, 2005.
• The FG was not broke when Mallam Lamido Sanusi CBN Governor bailed out failed banks (Oceanic, Intercontinental, etc) with N620 billion of PUBLIC FUND to private selfish businesses.
• The FG was not broke when Mrs. Iweala admitted that N2.6trillion was paid as fuel subsidy for un-delivered fuel in 2012 to the cronies of the presidency.

DARE TO STRUGGLE, DARE TO WIN!

Comrade ABIODUN AREMU

JAF Secretary

08033347962