Nigeria’s 2019 election is just by the corner. Key institutions with roles in the process are priming up for it, with the exception of the country’s public universities which are currently on a prolonged strike.

With under two months into the polls, this is a worrying situation which the electoral management body, the Independent National Electoral Commission, has raised concerns over. For roughly eight weeks since the beginning of the strike, no clear cut agreement has been reached between the Academic Staff Union of Universities and the government. 

“It is next to impossibility for members of the NYSC to provide all the ad hoc staff needs and requirements of the commission, and over 70 per cent of the ad hoc staff requirement in some states of the federation are drawn from students of federal tertiary institutions,” said  INEC National Commissioner for Information, Festus Okoye who in December revealed that the strike might have serious implications for the general elections.

“…hence, the lingering strike by ASUU will no doubt have serious impact on the preparations for the conduct of the 2019 elections. We therefore call on ASUU and the Federal Government of Nigeria to quickly and genuinely resolve the lingering impasse that has led to uncertainty in the education sector.” 

One thing is clear that if unresolved, the strike as a matter of consequence, would negatively disrupt the conduct of the 2019 elections.

How is the government responding?

Given the charged political climate and implications of the strike, it is expected that the federal government would move to placate ASUU. But not enough seems to have shifted at the moment as primarily the main contentious issue has to do with the funding.  The National Assembly had cut over 10 billion naira from the budget of the Ministry of Education in June 2018. 

President Muhammadu Buhari recently moved to reach out directly to the Nigerian university students in order to have them on his corner. According to news report from the meeting with the National Association of Nigerian Students, the president explained why it is impossible for the government to meet the demands of ASUU. 

“The president told us that the current price of crude oil is low and what the country is generating from that will not take care of all that government needs to provide for the people and also pay all the demands of ASUU,” according to one of the student delegates from the University of the Abuja who was quoted by the press. 

INEC would need enough time for it to recruit and prepare students who form the base of its workforce Returning Officers, Collation Officers, Supervisory Presiding Officers, and Assistant Presiding Officers. As it stands, if the schools do not resume in two weeks, then there might be major operational and logistical setback to the general elections who would need hundreds of thousands of them to support the polls. 

INEC’s use of students and academic staffs for elections across the country has become a grounded practice since its introduction in 2011 by INEC chairman Professor Attahiru Jega. 

Is there a middle ground?

The stakes are too high for a stalemate between the negotiating parties. One side has to yield, and given a history of both sides – the government side has won more battles.

ASUU led by its National President Prof. Biodun Ogunyemi has accused the FG of not honoring a mutual agreement. He also revealed that there was no progress being made in spite of the statements to the contrary from the government. 

“Government appears to have adopted ‘keep them talking’ strategy while deceiving the public that progress was being made and that partial agreements had been reached between union and government.”

The government has also refused to shift ground and appears to reechoe the same old talking points. In this context, agreeing to ASUU’s demands directly translates to injecting 1.3trillion Naira into the education system – a situation that government has maintained was impossible given the current fiscal situation. 

“Let me begin by saying that the issues necessitating this strike date back to 2009. However, the international oil prices crashed in subsequent years and threw the country into economic hardship, ” the Minister of Education, Adamu Adamu said.  

Adamu’s response summarizes the dilemma of the federal government but in all of this, ASUU remains resolute that the political necessities would not cause it to shift its stance.

Story first appeared on our microsite for the Nigerian Elections 2019.