The National President of the Academic Staff Union of Universities, Prof. Biodun Ogunyemi has said the situation of the country was not the change Nigerians voted for.
Ogunyemi said this while speaking at a public lecture and distinguished service award organised by the University of Ibadan chapter of the union on Wednesday.
He regarded the change promised by the All Progressives Congress as cosmetic, stating that the union was ready to educate Nigerians on the real change.
He said, “ASUU is not pleased with what is happening today for at least three reasons. In the first place, as a union of intellectuals, we cannot stay aloof, we cannot watch helplessly while the ruling class continues in its act of displacement of the country.
“What has happened in this country in the last 10 years or so should be enough to transform this country if not to another Japan, but at least maybe to another Malaysia or Singapore. What we are having now is the Structural Adjustment Programme in another form.
“We must sow the seed of that change; the correct change. The change they are talking about is cosmetic. We are talking about revolutionary change. Are we prepared for that? We need to gird our loins. ASUU as a union is committed to doing that. It’s like the Nigerian ruling class does not have a template for governance or development. As long as that continues, we’ll be regressing and not progressing.”
Ogunyemi also said Nigerians did not ask for enslavement.
“Is this the kind of change you asked for? A change without transformation, is this the change you asked for? Nigerians asked for change, Nigerians did not ask for enslavement. That is why we must be interested in what is happening in Nigeria. For those that are calling themselves progressives, we are yet to see the progress the progressives are building,” he said.
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