Trade unions in the University of Maiduguri (UNIMAID) have called on the Federal Government to to check its insensitive attitude towards security threats by Boko Haram in the school.
The Unions alleged that the government’s inaction on the security situation is boosting Boko Haram ideology in the region.
“Boko Haram proclaims western education as forbidden and the University of Maiduguri is at the forefront of championing western education in the country,” leader of the unions and chairman, Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), Dr Dani Mamman said on Wednesday at a press conference in Maiduguri.
“So for Boko Haram’s sustained attacks on the university would attenuate the insurgents’ wild ideology.”
Mamman said ASUU, SSANU (Senior Staff Association of Nigerian Universities), NASU (Non-Academic Staff Union), NATT (National Association of Academic Technologies), and Student Union Government (SUG) of the University were compelled to bring to the public the precarious security situation and threats to life at UNIMAID.
He disclosed that increasing Boko Haram attacks in the state in recent time shows that the insurgents were regrouping again, warning the government to wake up to its responsibility.
Mamman noted that the unions were particularly worried that neither the minister of education nor a Federal Government delegation has visited the University since Boko Haram first bombed the university campus, killing a professor of veterinary medicine, Prof. Aliyu Usman Mani on 16th January.
He said the government’s inaction reflects its “insensitivity to the plight of the University, students and parents” that lost loved ones.
The latest attack on the University was a multiple explosions on 25th June.
“That was the eighth attack within five months,” the ASUU chairman said.
He disclosed that 70 professors and other staff that fled the university in the wake of incessant attacks have started returning only to be confronted with suicide bomb attacks even while peace was gradually returning to the troubled state.
He urged the Federal Government to build the perimeter fence at the varsity and approve the N2.8 billion requested by the University authority to procure modern security equipment to stop Boko Haram from executing “greater attacks” on the campus.
The unions threatened to distrupt academic calendar of the University should the Federal Government fail to act in time.
