Osun State Governor, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola has urged striking lecturers of the Ladoke Akintola University of Technology (LAUTECH) to suspend their strike and return to work in the interest of the students of the institution.
According to Aregbesola, the plight of the students whose precious time is being wasted as a result of the protracted strike of the lecturers should be considered.
He also lamented that the industrial action is jeopardizing the students future.
Aregbesola stated this on Sunday while at a reception held in honour of medical students of Osun state University who returned from Ukraine where they were sent by the state government to further their studies in medicine.
The governor maintained that it was not for anybody to have the notion that the two owner state governors, Aregbesola and Abiola Ajimobi of Oyo State are being insensitive towards the situation of LAUTECH and stressed that the reality is that the two states are incapacitated financially.
He added that it is unfortunate that while civil servants in the upper cadre of the civil service have agreed to be collecting a fraction of their salaries, the lecturers of LAUTECH have refused to make sacrifice and pretended not to understand the financial situation of the two states.
Aregbesola said: “I am using this medium to appeal to the striking lecturers of LAUTECH to please return to work in the interest of the students whose future are being jeopardized.
“I urge them to reason along the same line of thought of the two owner states for a solution to be quickly found in solving the problem.
“It will be wrong for anybody to have the notion that the two owner state governors are being insensitive towards the situation of the school.
“It is not a matter of being insensitive, the truth is that the two owner states are financially incapacitated if they want to meet the demands of the striking lecturers, there is no way you can give what you don’t have.
“If the higher cadre of the civil service in Osun can agree to be collecting a fraction of their salaries because of the harsh economic condition government has found itself, I see no reason why the LAUTECH lectures can’t reason with government.”
Aregbesola wondered why the Osun state University with fewer numbers of students could manage itself within its Internally Generated Revenue and LAUTECH with more students population could not.
He noted that a proper audit of the LAUTECH accounts is sacrosanct as part of the solution to the crisis rocking the school.
“If UNIOSUN with fewer numbers of students than LAUTECH could run successfully within its internally generated revenue, I see no reason why LAUTECH with more students population can not run itself.
“We want this problem to be over so that our children can return to school and pursue their academic carrier.
“I appeal to the lecturers to return to class while a proper audit of the school will be done so as to unravel the real problem of the school and we can correct it.” Aregbesola stressed.
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