The suspension of admissions in Nigerian universities has led to the failure of the universities to process a total of 461,745 admissions, investigation by Saturday PUNCH has revealed.
The Joint Admissions and Matriculations Board in the statistics provided for our correspondent, however, blamed the strike by the Academic Staff Union of Universities for the development.
“Some institutions confirmed suspending the process because of the ASUU strike; ASUU strike is a factor; many institutions are yet to commence 2021 admissions despite repeated appeals,” JAMB noted in the document.
Our correspondent also gathered that a total of 36,947 candidates of the 2021 Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examinations processed their admissions in private institutions.
Strike actions by university-based unions such as ASUU, Senior Staff Association of Nigerian Universities; Non-Academic Staff Union of Universities and other allied institutions have continued to cripple academic activities in federal and state universities.
For instance, under the administration of former President Olusegun Obasanjo, ASUU embarked on strike in 1999 for a period of 150 days; 90 days in 2001; 14 days in 2002; 180 days in 2003; 14 days in 2005; three days in 2006 and 90 days in 2007.
Under the administration of late Umaru Yarad’ua, the union went on strike in 2008 for seven days; 120 days in 2009.