President Muhammadu Buhari, on Tuesday, received the House of Representatives’ report on its intervention in the protracted strike by the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU).
The President promised to study and meet the legislators again.
Speaking to State House correspondents after the meeting, the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Hon Femi Gbajabiamila, expressed hope that the impasse would be sorted out soon.
Recall that House of Representatives had last Thursday met with the leadership of the striking ASUU and the representatives of the federal government in Abuja, with a view to ending the almost eight months old industrial action.
ASUU had embarked on one month warning strike on February 14 over the alleged failure of the government to address their concerns.
However, emerging from the meeting with Buhari on Tuesday, leader of the House of Representatives team, Gbajabiamila, said the President had received their report and requested for a few days to study it, adding that another meeting would be convened either Thursday or Friday.
According to him, “We came here for one reason and one reason only; after a series of engagements with ASUU and with people on the executive side, we’ve been able to come to some kind of decision, on our part, and recommendations to be made to Mr. President for his approval.
“That’s why we’re here because, as you know, what’s on the front burner today, beyond the politics, is our universities, our lectures, and our children who are out of school and the House of Representatives decided to step in at that point, four weeks ago.
“We’ve had a series of meetings that lasted hours and that’s… we came to discuss with Mr. President about those recommendations. That’s why we’re here.
“Mr. President, as usual, had a very good listening hear and he took the report of the House, accepted it, we discussed it at length, the details of the report, and he wanted to go through them himself and he’ll get back to us.
“We have another meeting on Thursday, between our good selves and Mr. President, for his final decision.”
Fielding question on whether there was hope for resolution of the industrial dispute, he said, “Oh, absolutely very hopeful. We had a good engagement, very positive response. He asked us a couple of questions in some gray areas, which we clarified and he accepted the report and he wanted a couple of days to go through it”.
Asked if House of Representatives had scheduled more meetings with ASUU, he said “no. We’re done with our meetings with ASUU. We’ve made our reports and we’ve done our recommendations.
“All that is left now, as we speak, is for us to come back here on Thursday, maybe Friday, I don’t know, in the next couple of days for Mr. President. He wants to digest the report in detail and we won’t know anything until Thursday or Friday”.
