ASUU strike: Unical students disappointed, call for dialogue

The indefinite strike announced by the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), has taken most students of the University of Calabar unaware, with most of them seeing on campus loitering helplessly.

Some of the students described the strike action by their lecturers as “sad” and “disappointing.”

The students said in separate interviews with our reporter on Monday that they hope the union and the Federal Government would settle their differences soon.

Miss Henrietta Udom, a 200 level student told our reporter that she was sad about the situation.

“We are already preparing for our second semester examination before this sudden stop in academic activities, and now nobody knows when the strike will be called off, it’s unfortunate,” she said.

Another student, Michael Bassey, a final year student, feared that the strike might prolong his graduation.

“ASUU should always take students’ plights into consideration and consult widely before embarking on strike.

“Government on the one hand, should know that frequent strike does not augur well for the country’s education sector.

“May be because many of them have their children overseas, they do not consider some of us here in Nigeria,” he lamented.

Mr Johnson Ibe, a 300 level student also appealed to both ASUU and the federal government to reach a final resolution on the issues in contention to save the university system from collapse.

He noted that students and parents were the greatest losers in such strike.

“Tomorrow people will say that Nigerian graduates are half baked and they forget that, we cannot get the best quality by allowing lecturers to go on strike every now and then,” Ibe said.