NIGERIA (Commonwealth Union) – If teachers who have teaching jobs in the public sector have heard all the promises the politicians have made in their life time of teaching, then they have heard it all. The first thing any politician promises is to bring up the wages of our public sector educators as they are the future of the country’s youth.
However, these promises are rarely kept and what happens is the teachers then have to resort to methods such as going on strike to make sure they get a pay raise they so well and truly deserve. Sometimes it is not even about the pay. Sometimes they just want more funding so the schools can provide suitable teaching environments for the children.
Then we come to the problem of the public universities where the Academic Staff Union of Universities have been on strike for the last few months. They are taking action so that there will be funding provided for the public universities in Nigeria. The ASUU has made it very clear that the strike will only end when their demands of financial support will be fulfilled.
Public education should not have to suffer this much to get finance since it is an education system that can be afforded by everyone. The children of a country should be able to receive an education no matter what kind of financial background they come from. The universities are in need of financing. The ASUU wants to make sure that this financial aid comes through.
They have gone through the trouble of putting together a descriptive report which outlines the areas where the financial support will be used. Most of the finances will go towards things such as computer labs, science lab and even afterschool tuition programmes for the students that need it.
