In a bid to put a stop to the lingering crisis that has bedeviled the Ladoke Akintola University of Technology (LAUTECH), Ogbomoso over the years, members of the Oyo State House of Assembly have requested the assembly to mandate Governor Abiola Ajimobi of the state to, as a matter of urgency, seek assistance from the National leader of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, who is the Chancellor of the institution.
While making the request, the Minority Leader of the house, Hon. Oyebamiji Lagunju requested the assembly to mandate the governor to seek Tinubu’s assistance to save the institution.
Lagunju, who represents Oriire State Constituency, while speaking during the plenary on Tuesday after the committee to investigate the lingering crises presented its report, opined that “the only solution to the crisis is for Tinubu to wade in, as the chancellor of the institution, with a view of finding a lasting solution to the issue of indebtedness of the two owner states, Oyo and Osun”.
He said if Asiwaju Tinubu’s input had been sorted by governors of the two owner states, “the crisis would have been heading towards resolution point”, adding that “the Osun State Government had not been showing much concern about the lingering crisis in the institution”.
The call for Tinubu’s assistance which was supported by other members of the house, according to the lawmakers would go a long way in saving the institution from unnecessary crisis.
DAILY POST recalls that a member of the house Hon. Olawumi Oladeji (Ogbomoso North) had last year called for the constitution of a committee, with a view to proffering solutions to the crisis.
Part of what formed the call was the need by the two owner states to specifically address the non-payment of salaries of LAUTECH staff, which she said, had led to many months of industrial strike.
Meanwhile, the report of the Committee on Education, Science and Technology on the need to avert another industrial action by unions in the institution, presented on Tuesday by Hon. Afeez Adeleke, (Iseyin/Itesiwaju) recommended to the house that the two governors of the states Senator Abiola Ajimobi (Oyo) and Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola (Osun) “be urged to release the outstanding subventions due to the institution to pay salary arrears to workers of LAUTECH in order to prevent a looming strike, being proposed by the staff unions of the institution”.
Similarly, the report recommended that the two state governments be urged to mandate KPMG, a renowned auditing firm, assigned to audit the account of the institution to expedite action and submit its report within three weeks assigned to it, while it appealed to the various unions in LAUTECH to suspend all plans towards embarking on another strike action.
The report also called on the two state governments to expedite action towards the release of report of the technical committee set up to look into the report of the visitation panel to LAUTECH early this year.
While deliberating on the committee report, majority of the assembly members who contributed opined that the government of Osun had been showing less concern to plight of the LAUTECH staff by not fulfilling its own commitment to the joint ownership status of the institution.
Speaker of the house, Hon. Michael Adeyemo then appealed to other lawmakers of the house to give the two state governments benefit of the doubt, hoping that they would respond appropriately to the committee report presented to the Assembly.
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