Nigeria’s government said it will adopt voluntary conciliation to end the ongoing strike by the Universities Academic Staff Union (ASUU).
This was revealed by the Minister of Labour and Employment, Senator Chris Ngige on Tuesday at a 3-day capacity building workshop on International Labour Standards and Dispute Resolution in Nigeria on Tuesday in Abuja.
He revealed that voluntary conciliation was adopted instead of arbitration so as not to delay the resolution process with the striking speakers.
At the event organized by the Industrial Arbitration Panel (IAP) in collaboration with the International Labor Organization (ILO), the Minister stated that he would have referred the matter to the IAP or the National Industrial Court of Nigeria (NICN).
“But I used my discretion to weigh the situation to see if it would cause further delay in resolving the dispute in court,” he said.
He added that “ASUU embarked on strike on February 14 and the voluntary conciliation began on February 22 and later on March 1, citing that for the second meeting, most of the problems arising from the Memorandum of Action (MOA) of 2020 signed between ASUU and the Ministry of Education with other government agencies involved, were reconciled leaving only two.
“The two pending issues were the conditions of service, which according to the 2009 Agreement would be reviewed every four years.
“The last review was in 2013 and we started the review in 2018 under Wale Babalakin (SAN) as chairman of the renegotiation committee. We couldn’t conclude because Babalakin left.
“A new committee headed by Munzali has arrived. Munzali finished his work and submitted his report to the Federal Ministry of Education,” he said.
He added that all the committees, including the previous Onosode committee, were internal committees of the Ministry of Education.
“The main problem here is the review of wages and salaries. That’s where they are before ASUU went on strike,” he said, adding that a strike triggers the content of the Trade Disputes Act (TDA) on how to resolve industrial action.
“If one of the parties wants us to pass on a matter to them for a second time, you help them. That’s what you call voluntary conciliation.”
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