Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) has replied the Minister of Education, Prof. Tahir Mamman following his statement that the federal government will grant universities full autonomy to operate.
The Union President, Prof Emmanuel Osodeke, gave the reply on Thursday.
He said the federal government cannot stop funding universities in the country as it is constitutional.
Minister of Education Prof. Tahir Mamman, has said that the federal government will grant full autonomy to universities to explore new ways of funding its activities.
According to Osodeke, “there is no way the federal government of Nigeria would say they would not fund public universities because it is there in the law. It is there in the Constitution; look at Section 18 of the Constitution; it says ‘university, primary, and secondary are free.
“The only problem is that it is not judicious; that’s the only problem, so I said, I don’t think this government, from what we have seen, is going to say we are going to hand them off from university.
“If you check the ratio of Nigeria’s education budget to our GDP, it’s one of the lowest in the world,” ASUU President said.
