Afe Babalola Faults Fed Govt for Taking ASUU to Court

The Founder of Afe Babalola University Ado-Ekiti (ABUAD), Chief Afe Babalola, has disagreed with the Federal Government for taking the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) to court, saying that agreement should be honoured in performance and not in disobedience.

The legal icon appealed to the Federal Government to pay all outstanding salaries to university teachers and fund education adequately.

Babalola, who spoke, yesterday, at the public presentation of “The Patriots” in Lagos, said: “There is urgent need for the Federal Government to inject financial stimulus into all Nigerian universities to make them financially equipped and self-sufficient.”

According to a statement by ABUAD spokesperson, Mr. Tunde Olofintila, which was made available to newsmen in Ado-Ekiti, Babalola said that it was only when education is adequately funded that universities will be able to perform their statutory functions of quality teaching, up-to-date research and impact their communities.

According to Babalola, it is not an over-statement to say that education in particular is in crisis in Nigeria today, adding that the United Nations (UN) recommends that every country should spend at least 26 per cent of its yearly budget on education.

“In compliance, Canada expends 28 per cent of its yearly national budget on education. Ghana spends about 30 per cent of its budget on education (almost nine per cent of its GDP), currently the highest in the world,” he said.

“Unfortunately, however, despite perennial rhetoric by successive Nigerian governments on their plans to build world-class universities in Nigeria, they have consistently failed to meet the UNESCO funding benchmark,” he said.