The Committee of Pro-Chancellors of state-owned Universities (COPSUN) has made a case for the removal of labour and wages issues from the exclusive legislative list of the Nigerian Constitution.
This they said would allow state governments exercise appropriate control over their workers.
In a communiqué issued at the end of its 52nd quarterly meeting in Abuja on Tuesday, the committee, presided over by Mallam Yusuf Ali, stressed that state governments should be allowed to negotiate wages with their workers.
COPSUN said the rights of trade unions to demand for welfare of their members should be based on employer-employee relationship.
Worried by the instability in the academic calendars of the state universities owing to incessant strikes by the academic and non-academic staff unions, the committee appealed to the Academic Staff Union of Nigerian Universities (ASUU) to de-emphasize strikes as the major tool of negotiation with the federal government.
It noted that the disruption of the academic calendars has adversely affected the quality of the nation’s universities, their products and research outputs, adding that the core values of education have been negatively impacted by the instability in the university system resulting in falling standards.
The committee announced that as its own contribution to the reform of tertiary education in Nigeria, an international conference will be organized before the end of the year to consider the various challenges facing universities and proffer appropriate solutions.