The Minister of Labour and Employment, Dr Chris Ngige, is scheduled to meet with the leadership of the Academic Staff Union of Universities and other relevant agencies.

This is as the four week warning total and comprehensive strike embarked upon by the union enters its third week on Monday.

The spokesperson of the Ministry of Labour and Employment, Charles Akpan, made this known to our correspondent in Abuja on Saturday.

UGAMATV reports that ASUU and the Federal Government had begun series of negotiations aimed towards the suspension of the recently declared total and rolling four-week strike declared by the union.

ASUU during its extra-ordinary National Executive Council meeting held at the University of Lagos on February 14, 2022 had declared a four-week comprehensive strike over what it claimed was the failure of the government to meet its demands.

The president of the union, Professor Emmanuel Osodeke, had insisted that the union would transform the strike to an indefinite strike if the government failed to honour its demands among which it listed as the release of earned allowances, release of revitalisation funds for universities, increase in salary scale of lecturers, deployment of the UTAS payment platform for university workers among others.

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Following ASUU’s declaration, religious organisations, House of Representatives, students’ bodies among others had called on the Federal Government to intervene in the strike by the union.

But Akpan stated that Ngige would be meeting with the leadership of ASUU to continue the negotiation talks.

 He said, “The Honourable Minister for Labour and Employment, Dr. Chris Ngige, will be meeting with the Executive of ASUU and relevant government agencies. The meeting is on Tuesday, 1st March 2022 by 2 pm.”