Nigeria students vows to close down private universities.

Ado Ekiti — UNIVERSITY students under the umbrella of
National Association of Nigerian Students, NANS,
yesterday, took to the streets in Ado Ekiti, Ekiti State
capital, calling on the Federal Government to accede to
the demands of the Academic Staff Union of
Universities, ASUU.
They equally threatened to shut down activities in the
private universities in the country should the crisis
linger on.
The students who displayed several placards with
various inscriptions, lambasted the Federal Government
for its failure to honour the agreement it entered into
with ASUU since 2009.
Protest: Polytechnic students protesting against
ongoing nationwide strike, on Ikorodu Road, Lagos,
yesterday.
Speaking on behalf of his colleagues, Asafon Sunday,
Director of Action and Mobilisation NANS, South–West,
claimed between 2000 and 2011 the Nigerian
government earned about N48.48 trillion from the sale
of oil alone, against N3.10 trillion earned between 1979
and 1999
He said the Federal Inland Revenue Service, FIRS, in
2012 financial year alone generated N5.12 trillion from
tax paid by the masses.
According to him: “With this tremendous upswing in
the revenue at the disposal of the Nigerian government,
one would have expected such to translate to
commensurate improvement in the quality of Nigeria’s
public education as well as other social services.”
He condemned the refusal of Federal Government to
budget a reasonable amount of money to education
sector as recommended by UNESCO which is 26 per
cent of the country’s total budget.
Sunday noted that some countries with smaller Gross
Domestic Product, GDP, like Ghana, Cote d’Ivoire,
Kenya, Morocco and Botswana had budgetary
allocations to education sector as follow, 31 per cent,20
per cent,23 per cent ,17.7 per cent and 19 per cent
respectively to 8.5 per cent that Nigeria government
had budgeted for education in 2013.
Also speaking, Steven Adara ,a student leader from Ekiti
State University, EKSU , lamented that government
officials and prominent Nigerians were not bothered
about the crisis in the public universities because their
children were in private schools overseas.
According to him: “We will mobilise and disrupt
academic activities in the private universities because it
is the sons and daughters of the rich that are in these
schools.”