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Shoo Away! ASUU Members Verbally Assault Journalists At NEC Meeting (DETAILS)

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Journalist, who converged at the Federal University of Technology, Minna, Niger State to cover an emergency National Executive Council (NEC) meeting of the Academic Staff Union of Nigerian Universities (ASUU) Monday were physically assaulted and asked to leave the Senate building of the tertiary institution.

The ASUU meeting, which was shrouded in secrecy following several changes in venue for the meeting to more than three places, finally commenced at about 11.00 a.m. yesterday.

Meanwhile, the Senior Staff Association of Nigerian Universities (SSANU) has warned university authorities and the Federal Government against sack of non-teaching members of staff of universities, saying it “may not fundamentally address the problem of salaries and wages” since bulk of the salaries is expended on the academic members of staff.

Journalists, who got the wind of the ASUU meeting rushed to the university Senate Building venue to keep vigil with a view to knowing the outcome of the meeting only for the FUT, Minna ASUU chairman, Abdulfatai Jimoh, to storm out and ask security men to march out journalists from the venue.

Jimoh personally tried to push the Daily Trust correspondent, Aliyu Hamagan out of the venue of the meeting.

Abdulfatai had earlier thought Hamagan was a member of the union and invited him to come closer. He asked Hamagan: “Who brought this stupid people inside? What are they doing here?”

Hamagan quickly responded: “I am one of the people you are calling stupid. I will not have you insult us like that.”

Abdulfatai, on discovering that Hamagan was a journalist, pushed him, asking him to leave, saying: “You people are intruding. We did not invite you. Get out of this place now.”

As this was happening, members of the Local Organising Committee of the ASUU NEC meeting also stepped out of the meeting venue, joining Abdulfatai in shouting on the journalists.

Abdulfatai said to the newsmen in a mixture of pidgin and English: “Anything wey una see, make una take am like that because we didn’t invite the media.”

However, there was disagreement among the members over the presence of the media.

Some suggested the media should stay because they are doing their job, while others insisted: “We did not invite them. When we need them, we will invite them.”

When the Vice Chancellor of the institution, Prof. Musbau Akanji, got wind of the fracas, he quickly came in to plead with the journalists.

Akanji said: “Although, I am not a part of the meeting but I am apologising on their behalf because they are in my territory.

“This place (FUT, Minna) is a Federal Government institution and it is a public place that everybody, including journalists, can enter, especially when they are discharging their responsibilities.”

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