Representative Dachung Musa Bagos has urged the Federal Government to compensate the Academic Staff Union of Universities with some of the newly returned Abacha loot, which totals $23,439,724 million (ASUU).
Recall that on Tuesday, Nigeria and the USA inked a deal to repatriate $23,439,724 in recovered funds that were allegedly looted by the late General Sani Abacha.
Since February of this year, ASUU has been on strike in support of, among other things, enhanced welfare and revitalizing public universities.
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Since all attempts by the government to get the union to call off the strike have been successful, one point of discontent for academics is the non-payment of university revitalization funds, which total approximately N1.1 trillion.
Bagos, who represents Jos South/Jos East, questions why the new Abacha loot should not be utilized to settle ASUU when the government claims it does not have enough money to pay the academics.
We have urgent needs, Bagos stated on Channels Television’s Politics Today on Wednesday. ASUU has been on strike, as it is right now, and the administration is attempting to resolve those issues.
“As a representative of the people, if I have to argue where those funds should be channelled to on the floor, I will say, ‘Why can’t you channel this fund to ASUU so that most of the youths that are at home would go back to school?’ But some of the areas we feel that the executive is channelling those funds are not the immediate needs of Nigerians.”
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He added, “This is my third year in the National Assembly, we have never discussed any of the recovered loot. We just sit down and we hear that the executive recovered loot and allotted the same to projects that they so desire.
“We believe that when we discuss these issues at the National Assembly, we appropriate those funds according to the needs of Nigeria, it is going to go a long way; not just the executive looking at it and alloting it (the fund) to what they feel it should be. The constitution has given us that right.”
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