PARENTS and students of Nigerian universities on Sunday protested a two-week warning strike declared by the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), saying they will be biggest victims of the strike.

At a press briefing on Sunday at Yakubu Gowon University, Abuja, National President, ASUU, Prof Chris Piwuna, said the Nigerian government had failed to show commitment to addressing the union’s concerns and demands.

“Compatriots of the press, it goes without saying that there is nothing sufficient on the ground to stop the implementation of ASUU-NEC’s resolution to embark on a two-week warning strike at the expiry of the 14-day notice given on September 28, 2025,” Prof Piwuna said.

“Consequently, all branches of ASUU are hereby directed to withdraw their services with effect from midnight (12.01a.m.) on Monday, October 13, 2025. The warning strike shall be total and comprehensive as agreed at the last NEC meeting.”

“As stated in our media briefing of September 29, 2025, the NEC meeting “decried the neglect of the university system and the Government’s consistent refusal to heed its demands”. Consequently, NEC resolved to give the federal government of an ultimatum of fourteen 14 days within which to address these issues. If, at the end of the fourteen-day ultimatum, the federal government fails to address these issues, the union may have no option but to embark on a two-week warning strike without any further notice,” the statement read in part.”

ASUU president further noted that the Nigerian government had done nothing to change the position of the National Executive Council (NEC) of the uniion since the press briefing 14 days before.

ASUU is demanding the conclusion of the renegotiated 2009 FGN-ASUU Agreement, release of the withheld three-and-a-half months’ salaries of lecturers, sustainable funding of public universities, revitalisation of universities, and cessation of the victimisation of lecturers in Lagos State University (LASU), Kogi State University (now Prince Abubakar Audu University) and Federal University of Technology Owerri (FUTO).

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It is also requesting the payment of the outstanding 25 percent-35 percent salary arrears of lecturers, payment of promotion arrears for over four years, and release of withheld third-party deductions (cooperative contributions, union check-off dues), among others.

Parents, students kick

The decaration of the two-week strike did not go down well with parents and students who felt that the strike would end up achieving little, while students suffer the loss of academic time.

A father with two children in University of Lagos, Mr Anthony Odionu, said: “Why does ASUU always go on strike every now and again? Of all the strikes they have enbarked upon since 1999, what have have they achieved? Up till now, they are still discussing the 2009 Agreement when some of the demands in the agreement may have been overtaken by time. At the end of the day, it is the students who will suffer loss.”

A banker, whose daughter is a student of FUTO, Ms Patience Udom, said: “ASUU has embarked upon strikes 16 times since 1999, yet nothing much has improved in our universities. Can they look for another way of making their demands known, rather than through strikes? At the end of the day, we do not have more lecturers’ exchange programmes with foreign universities; we do not have better laboratories than our neighbouring countries, and our research has not featured in global magazines.”

She, however, blamed the Nigerian government for letting the nation’s academics down, noting that “when they go abroad, we begin to blame them. Yet, the government cannot meet some of their basic demands.”

A student of Ahmadu Bello University, Ms Khalifa Ahmed, told Economy Post that she would use the opportunity to learn artificial intelligence.

“It is a pity that we are going to be home for two weeks. This explains why rich parents send their children to Ghana and other countries for studies. A programme that is supposed to last for four years will end up taking six years of your life. For me, I will deepen my knowledge of AI during the strike,” she said.

Nigeria has embarked upon strikes 16 times since 1999. ASUU last went on strike in 2022, beginning on February 14 and ending it on October 14, reflecting an 8-month period. The union had earlier gone on strike in 2020 between March 23 and December 23, 2020, marking the longest strike in recent times.

A student of University of Benin lamented that the strike may not end in two weeks. “What makes anyone believe the strike will last only for two weeks?” he asked, rhetorically.

“We will waste another one, two months of our academic life because the government does not take education seriously,” he noted.