By Muhammed Abubakar, Reporting
THE National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS) has explained why it chickened out of the planned blockade of the Kaduna-Abuja Highway on Wednesday.
Stonix News reports that the Kaduna State government had, on Wednesday evening, warned against compounding the security woes in the state and urged the students to lay down their arms.
NANS said the called off stand-off was due to security concerns raised at a meeting with security agencies, citing the volatile nature of Kaduna State.
The students body, however, advised the Federal Government to accept the sad realities of the public universities and work towards ending the lingering strike of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU).
In a press conference held at the secretariat of the Nigerian Union of Journalists (NUJ), Kaduna on Wednesday, the NANS Task Force, committee chairman, Comrade Dominic Phillip, also observed that there was no commitment being demonstrated by the parties involved to bring an end to the protracted strike action.
Philip explained that NANS could not sit back and watch the students’ future and future of the nation being wasted.
He noted that the egotistical and unyielding disposition of those responsible for resolving the crisis amicably was contributing to the ongoing ASUU strike.
He described the strike action as “unbearable and sad development having lost a whole academic session at home due to nonchalant attitude of the Federal Government to reach an amicable conclusion with ASUU to end its strike.
On why the ealier plan to block Abuja-Kaduna highway was called off, the student leader remarked that security concerns were raised at a meeting with heads of DSS, the Police and Civil Defence who cited volatile and peculiar nature of Kaduna State.
“Our earlier decision was sheathed in the interest of the state, country and our people who may be victims of unforseen circumstances that may arise in the event our good intention was abused by unscrupulous elements who do not mean well for our dear nation.
“However, due to several calls from well-meaning Nigerians and calls by the security agencies for considerations of the peculiarity of Kaduna with regard to the violatility of the security of the city, we have chosen to demonstrate the kind of gesture that we expect the negotiating parties, especially the Federal Government, to exhibit in their meetings so that there could be a headway towards ending the strike.
“We have made compromises to our earlier plans of commencing mass action today, by deferring the protest to also consolidate on the new schedule released by the National Executive Council of NANS,” he averred.
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