COVID-19: Holding Physical Lectures Now Will Be Disastrous – FUNAAB ASUU

Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) at the Federal University of Agriculture, Abeokuta said the university was not ready to cope with COVID-19 challenges.

The Chairman of ASUU-FUNAAB,  Dr Adebayo Oni, in an interview on Sunday, stated, “The lectures halls are overcrowded.  As of today, in my own campus,  I have not seen any facility for hand washing  Who is to provide sanitisers? Do you expect lecturers to provide sanitisers for themselves?

“Fumigation of the environment from time to time should be done, How do you cope with students surge and  the challenge of power supply ?”

Oni said the union had observed that conducting physical lectures with students would be more disastrous.

He described as alarming, figure of COVID-19.  He said, “It is definitely  a threat to the resumption of academic activities .

“The fact is that under this circumstance and looking at the threat of the figure, going physical with students would be more disastrous. Conducting physical session, physical lectures with students would be more disastrous.

“The truth of the matter is that we now propose a mixed model of online teaching and probably some level of physical teachings.

“Even the online teaching also comes with its own facilities which are not readily available.

“We don’t want to be pessimistic to say that it is not going to be workable. However , it is going to be at the risk of  our lives and the lives of our students if the required facilities are not  provided by the government.

“The truth is that the facilities to cope with the pandemic are not available in our institutions. It appears the government is not ready and our institutions are not helpful.”