The Minister of State for Labour and Employment, Festus Keyamo, has said the Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU, cannot push the federal government into borrowing.
Keyamo stated this on Friday during an interview on the Channels Television programme Politics Today.
The minister said the striking ASUU members had turned deaf ears to all avenues explored by the federal government to end the strike.
He accused ASUU of failing to honour dialogue with the key stakeholders holding the federal government’s purse.
Keyamo said the government could not go beyond its capacity and plunge into another burden of borrowings.
He stressed that not only ASUU feeds from the federal government purse.
COCONOPS had reported that ASUU extended the ongoing strike by another four weeks after the Federal Government failed to address outstanding issues raised by the union.
ASUU president, Prof Emmanuel Osodeke, who disclosed this in a statement on Monday, explained that the National Executive Council (NEC) of the Union decided to extend the strike after the Federal government failed to abide by its timelines in addressing the issues it raised.