Governor of Kaduna State, Nasir El-Rufai, has threatened to sack all the Kaduna State University (KASU) lecturers if they continue to observe the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) strike.
Recall that the academic union embarked on strike on February 14 over the failure of the federal government to meet its demands.
But speaking on a radio programme in Kaduna on Wednesday, El-Rufai told the lecturers to return to classrooms in order to avoid having their positions declared vacant, adding that KASU lecturers had no reason to join any strike.
According to him, ASUU had a problem with the federal government, not the state government.
He said, “The Acting Vice Chancellor has assured me that they will resume, but I have asked them to find out if they actually resumed work, because I initially instructed that their salary be stopped. But I was later told they didn’t join the strike, so I asked that it should be investigated and those that collected salary and joined the strike will be asked to refund the salary.
“This is because Nigeria’s law says ‘no work, no pay’. This is the law. So whoever joined the strike will not be paid a salary. We have been telling the KASU lecturers that they have no problem with the State government. ASUU’s problem is with the Federal government. Therefore, why will our staff who have no problems with us join the strike?
“If this continues, I will wake up one day to sack them all, I swear to God. We will sack them all and declare their positions vacant on the pages of newspapers. They once did the same thing and we gave them warning, now they repeated it. I’m only waiting to receive the report from the commissioner for education. I swear to God, we will sack all those that joined the strike if they refuse to resume work.”
Speaking on the threat by terrorists to abduct him and President Muhammadu Buhari, the Kaduna governor Buhari was not aware of the threat until he informed him.
Terrorists had on Sunday July 24, 2022, after flogging abducted Abuja-Kaduna train victims in the forest, vowed in a trending video to capture Buhari and El-rufai.
“I also heard about a video where they threatened to abduct Buhari and myself. I have been warned to be careful, including my families too,” he said.
According to him, for the past five years, he had been advocating for the bombing of terrorists’ camps wherever they were, adding that it was the only solution to the problem.
El-rufai said, “This is why I met with the president on Sunday and told him about these problems. I also told him about the video because up to that day, he was not even aware. I told him and the following day, Zamfara State governor, Bello Matawalle also confirmed to him that he saw the video too, so as to take action.”
According to the Kaduna governor, Buhari assured him that he met with the service chiefs 3-4 days before the meeting and that he gave them a clear directive to have a comprehensive military operation to deal with those people.
He added that “we hope, God willing, the soldiers and the police that were given the directives will hasten up to finish the job. We don’t have to wait until they (terrorists) strike before we respond.
“They (soldiers) must go after them wherever they are to deal with them. The truth is we are worried about the security situation, but we hope the federal government will do the right thing
