Why Buhari should implement a no-work, no-pay policy, according to Sowore

Speaking on the disputes between the Federal Government and the Academic Staff Union of Universities, African Action Congress presidential candidate Omoyele Sowore suggested that the president, Major General Muhammadu Buhari, be subject to the alleged “no work, no pay” policy (retd.).

At the presidential town hall hosted by Daria Media and Cabal Entertainment on Friday night, Sowore stated that if the FG must implement the “no work, no pay” policy, it must begin with Buhari because he hardly works.

When asked how he could handle the government’s insistence on applying the policy to ASUU, who went on strike for eight months, Sowore argued that Nigerian workers must be paid when their strike is motivated by a reasonable course of action.

“You will have to pay the strikers when the strike is just,” Sowore remarked. They were coerced into doing this by the government; they didn’t want to.

“I believe the President should be first because he hardly works, if you want to start the enforcement of not paying the individuals who are not working. The fact is that these are the things that cause the issues to get worse. You cannot keep doing the things that caused the problems in order to make them worse.

“Our higher education institutions are too significant to be used as a pawn in legal technicalities. Let’s give them the money they requested. When describing how much they want, they are precise. Let’s locate the funds and hand them over to them. Since the 1990s, they have made the same requests.

The AAC standard-bearer claimed that while it might be argued that education was costly, it was not as costly as it was perceived to be given its significance in society.

ASUU had declared a strike on February 14, 2022, in protest of what it claimed was the government’s failure to abide by its demands, which included increased funding for the nation’s government-owned tertiary institutions.

The eight-month strike came to a conclusion on October 14; however, the professors only received half their salaries for the month of October since the administration insisted on implementing the “No work, no pay” policy even though they had requested payment for the time they had been on strike.

ASUU branches then started to oppose the half-pay.