ASUU STRIKE. The GOOD, The BAD and The BOTTOMLINE.

It’s been about 60 days since the Academic Staff Union of Universities decided to go freeze on business in a bid to make a point to the Federal Government. They are saying there have been agreements, nine of them, dated as far back as 2009 and the government has failed to fulfill their end of the bargain. Although, two of the nine agreements have been met; the retirement age issue, now age 70 and no longer 65 and the re-installment of prematurely dissolved councils.

I checked out the issue on Google as well and came across Mr. Isaa-Fagee’s (National President ASUU) justification of the strike of which he mentioned and explained a couple of things further, I’m not going into details, for two simple reasons, the first is ‘cos that’s not exactly the point of this write up and secondly and sincerely, that stuff is long (like for real)

I couch sit every morning and attentively listen on maybe kaakaki or some regular morning news on what the issues are about, several interviews and documentaries also go by but none has done much good to help me figure out what the concern is. One time there’s an imbursement of N100 billion for university infrastructure and some N30 billion to assist some governing councils but ASUU insist that they are still owed N92 billion for allowance and all and all that razzmatazz is in a bid to digress from the real issue.

But in all, there’s one party in this entire chaos that seems to be too much on the receiving end, ironically, they are the least mentioned in this bedlam. I’m referring to the students, We hear of the opinion of the FG and the ASUU but students are only mentioned out of sentiments and pity, like I once heard a reporter say and I quote “we hope ASUU would at least, pity these students and go back to work” that’s the most we’ve gone on been heard on this issue.

Now, I’ve not come to start an attention seeking rally for students, I just want to draw our attention to the fact that we students are the ones on the receiving end and I’ll explain that in a bit.

My lecturers are at the moment on an undue leave from work, so, they have some time for some extra work which implies extra pay, extra study which means extra worth and more family time and still, they receive their monthly payment. So then they seem to have little or nothing to lose. The FG still has its entire sector at work (at least not on strike, asides the Nigerian Health Workers who have followed suit.) and all they seem to be worried about is their reputation, integrity and competence (that would have been a lot though if they knew what mattered). But guess what, we the student are lying jobless at home, our society still has issues providing decent jobs for graduates, talk less of a summer job for undergraduates.

Worse again is that the number of years we spend in school are being stretched and our semester calendar will later be shrinked to catch up with the delay, we’ve almost unlearned all we have learnt previously and like the joke--we are trying hard not to forget our matriculation numbers. What worries me most is what our idle minds are forced to think about, making it fully equipped as the devil’s workshop ……..*sighs*…….I can go on and on with the list of negatives but then the essence would be lost.

Anyways I’ve missed out on the title arrangement and I just listed out the bad. But the good things is …………………………..*thinking*…………………………..okay, the good thing is that behind every dark cloud, there’s a silver lining and I’ve learnt to always believe this. There’s this one time I had an accident with my mum’s car, and when I was done searching for a silver lining and did not find one , I remember telling myself “at least I’ve had an accident experience while behind the wheels” funny right? Trust me, it helped ease the regret.

So, I think the good thing here is there is a lot of free time, what you do with your free time is now your choice. You have an option of self-development with books, tapes, short courses (like the RHEMAWORD LEADERSHIP ACADEMY), you have enough time to strategize and venture into a business or pioneer a cause, you also have an option of a job (if you are fortunate to find one), there’s time now to strengthen relationships and catch up on lost times and also give value to these relationships that would last a life time in the process. Then again, you can decide to sit back and talk about the situation of the system and in the process not make yourself a classic change agent by getting busy with the possible. For the first two weeks of my return from school, my mind was as idle as an abandoned construction site, so I got thinking, and well BlogToLyfe was birthed in my spirit.

I have friends venturing out to catch up with new stuffs; the NMMNG music Crew has released some new songs, Bolanle took on her heels to Ife when she heard of Rhemaword Leadership Academy (RLA), same as Victoria and Kemi, Tuokpe is at a makeover training institute, Damian is on IT, and the list goes on and on and on……..

The bottom line is, at the end of the strike, you’ll either be glad or sad, trained or drained, exhausted or rejuvenated. Whichever way, it’ll be your choice. So get busy, Get busy with that craft or that hobby that pays, get your minds working on ideas that could make a change, because the world is only going to remember those who walked this earth leaving giant marks as they walked by. Once again the bottom line is get busy for a change.

Until next time friends, I Love You and GOD bless You.

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