Movement for the Emancipation of Nigeria (MEN) has called for the urgent and amicable resolution of the face off between the Federal Government and the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) to avert any industrial action by the Universities Union.
MEN in a statement on Sunday, 31st August, 2025, titled: “Reconciling the Looming Crisis Between the Federal Government and ASUU in the Face of Electoral Integrity Concerns”, signed by its Comrade General, Bar Solomon Selcap Dalung, warned that “This dispute, recurring with dangerous regularity, has once again placed the future of millions of Nigerian students on the line”.
The former Minister of Youth and Sports Development during the late President Muhammadu Buhari administration said “The Movement for the Emancipation of Nigeria (MEN) notes with deep concern the renewed crisis between the Federal Government and the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU). This dispute, recurring with dangerous regularity, has once again placed the future of millions of Nigerian students on the line. Education, the bedrock of national development, cannot continue to be treated as a disposable bargaining chip”.
The former University Law Lecturer who also accused some University professors of aiding and abiding electoral malpractices when they serve as Returning Officers added that “Beyond the industrial crisis, a graver moral question confronts our academic community: the betrayal of electoral integrity by some university professors. Reports of manipulated figures and compromised roles during elections have tarnished the ivory tower’s reputation. When those entrusted with shaping young minds descend to the level of political hirelings, the conscience of the nation suffers irreparable harm”.
“This dual crisis, government’s failure to honor agreements and academia’s moral compromise, underscores the urgent need for national reflection. The Federal Government must return to sincere, result, oriented dialogue with ASUU, while the union itself must cleanse its ranks of members who desecrate the sacred calling of truth by enabling electoral fraud”, he counseled.
Calling for accountability, “MEN therefore calls on all stakeholders, government, academia, civil society, and the Nigerian people, to insist on accountability. The government must keep faith with its obligations, and ASUU must hold its members to the highest ethical standards. To undermine education or subvert elections is to mortgage the future of Nigeria”.
Stressing the importance of education in nation building, the statement which was exclusively made available to Trill Times News concluded that “As a movement, we declare that no nation can rise when its classrooms are shut and its professors are compromised. MEN stands with Nigerian students and citizens in demanding truth, justice, and integrity. The time to act is now, for only through honesty and responsibility can the dignity of our universities be restored and the trust of the Nigerian people rekindled”.
