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| Lagos State University |
Academic activities across Lagos State’s publicly owned universities remain paralysed as lecturers and, more recently, non-academic staff intensify an indefinite industrial action rooted in the non-domestication and non-implementation of a landmark 2025 agreement between the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) and the Federal Government. What began as a focused ASUU protest in mid-September has broadened into a wider shutdown involving multiple unions, leaving thousands of students idle and raising pointed questions about the prioritisation of tertiary education funding in Nigeria’s wealthiest state.
Dr. Ibrahim Abiola Alabi, secretary of the ASUU branch at the Lagos State University of Education (LASUED) and a member of the Joint Action Committee, articulated the unions’ position clearly in a recent appearance on Nigeria Info’s Morning Crossfire. He stated that the ongoing strike stems directly from the failure of Lagos State-owned universities to implement the 2025 agreement reached between university unions and the Federal Government. “The strike has become necessary as a result of non-implementation of the 2025 House-to-Federal Government Agreement,” Alabi said. The agreement, signed in December 2025 and effective from January 2026, was intended to apply across the university system, including state institutions that participated in or were expected to domesticate its provisions.
According to Alabi, the unions exhausted diplomatic channels—writing multiple letters and holding meetings with government representatives—before withdrawing services. The industrial action entered its fourth week around early October 2026, with implementation originally expected to have begun roughly nine months earlier. He noted that the Lagos State Government had provided no formal response since the strike commenced on 15 September and that a scheduled meeting failed to hold. “We have not received any formal information,” Alabi said. Critically, he emphasised readiness to resume work immediately if demands are met: “We are ready to call it off today. We are tired of the strike.”
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Background: The 2025 Agreement and the Long Road to Renegotiation
The December 2025 ASUU-Federal Government agreement marked the conclusion of a prolonged renegotiation of the 2009 FGN-ASUU pact. After years of stalled committees and industrial disputes, the deal delivered a 40 percent upward review of academic staff emoluments, largely channelled through a new or enhanced Consolidated Academic Tools Allowance (CATA) designed to support research, publications, conferences, internet access, and professional development. It also introduced or strengthened welfare measures for serving and retired staff, including improved pension arrangements for professors (full annual salary pension upon retirement at age 70 under defined conditions), a professorial cadre allowance, and commitments on university autonomy, funding templates allocating specific percentages to libraries, laboratories, research, and staff development, plus proposals for a National Research Council funded at not less than 1 percent of GDP.
Federal universities began implementing aspects of the package. State universities, however, require formal domestication—adoption and funding by their state owners. Lagos, despite its substantial internally generated revenue (reported in some analyses around N1.77 trillion in relevant periods), has lagged. ASUU branches at Lagos State University (LASU), LASUED, and Lagos State University of Science and Technology (LASUSTECH) issued a 14-day ultimatum on 31 August 2026. A final warning followed on 10 September, and the deadline passed without what the union described as satisfactory engagement or a concrete plan. Separate congresses then declared a total, comprehensive, and indefinite strike effective 15 September.
Union statements signed by coordinators including Olusegun Babalola (ASUU-LASU), Grace Olayemi/Abimbola (ASUU-LASUED), and Murisiku Onigemo (ASUU-LASUSTECH) framed the action as a “rescue mission for Lagos State education.” Principal demands centred on full domestication of the December 2025 agreement, including CATA and critical welfare protections for active and retired academic staff.
Escalation: Joint Action Committee Broadens the Shutdown
The crisis widened when the Joint Action Committee (JAC)—comprising ASUU, the Senior Staff Association of Nigerian Universities (SSANU), the Non-Academic Staff Union of Educational and Associated Institutions (NASU), and the National Association of Academic Technologists (NAAT)—declared a total indefinite strike across LASU, LASUED, LASUSTECH, and the Lagos State University College of Medicine (LASUCOM) effective from midnight on 2 October 2026. This followed the expiration of a seven-day ultimatum tied to a communiqué signed on 31 August 2026 after technical committee consensus.
JAC Chairman Prof. Ibrahim Bakare detailed accumulated frustrations: agreed adjustments (including 40 percent CATA and 10 percent Earned Academic Allowance for ASUU members, and corresponding packages for non-teaching staff) and arrears from January 2026 were not reflected in September salaries, pushing outstanding payments to nine months. Demands expanded to include immediate executive approval and implementation of the agreements, one-off payment of the nine-month arrears, non-taxation of negotiated allowances, and fulfilment of earlier pledges such as a 20 percent salary adjustment linked to prior commitments and provision of operational buses.
The “Lagos Factor” and Cost-of-Living Realities
A distinctive element in the Lagos dispute is the “Lagos Factor”—an allowance intended to reflect the significantly higher cost of living in Nigeria’s commercial capital compared with many other states. Alabi described it as not entirely new; elements had previously featured in salary components, but unions now seek clearer structure under the new template. Government offers, he indicated, fell short of union demands. JAC statements have referenced a 15 percent Lagos Factor to cushion high costs of housing, transport, food, and other essentials in the megacity.
This demand highlights a structural tension: Lagos generates far more revenue than most states, yet lecturers report that professors in state-owned universities earn packages that struggle to match the city’s living costs, sometimes comparing unfavourably even with certain secondary school principals in the same jurisdiction. Unions and some commentators have noted that other states with thinner resources have begun implementing the 2025 agreement, intensifying perceptions of lag in Lagos.
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Government Position and Student Impact
Lagos State officials have signalled willingness to resolve the matter. In late September, Tertiary Education Commissioner Tolani Sule indicated that the government had agreed in principle to implement the 2025 agreement and was awaiting gubernatorial approval for fund release, expressing optimism that issues would be cleared that week.
Permanent Secretary Kasali Adeniran similarly referenced ongoing engagements and mutual understandings pending final approval. However, union leaders, including ASUU-LASU’s Babalola, have repeatedly stated that no formal positive response or meaningful dialogue with Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu (Visitor to the institutions) had materialised weeks into the action.
Students have borne the direct cost. Lectures, examinations, supervision, and administrative services halted first for academic staff and then more comprehensively. The National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS) Lagos Axis issued a 48-hour ultimatum in early October demanding resolution and warning of peaceful mass action if the shutdown persisted, underscoring the disruption to academic calendars and the anxiety of parents and young people whose education is on hold.
Broader Context and Analysis
Nigeria’s public university system has long been marked by cycles of negotiation, partial implementation, and industrial action. The 2025 agreement was widely welcomed as a potential stabiliser after more than a decade and a half of friction over the 2009 pact. Domestication by states remains uneven; some have moved forward while others, including Lagos, face accusations of bureaucratic delay or fiscal prioritisation debates.
Lagos’s high Internally Generated Revenue raises particular scrutiny: critics ask why a state with such fiscal capacity struggles to match or exceed federal benchmarks for its university staff, especially when the cost of living is demonstrably higher.
From the unions’ perspective, the strike is not merely about salaries but about dignity, research capacity, and preventing further brain drain. CATA is framed as essential for lecturers to function as academics rather than mere classroom instructors.
For the government, balancing competing claims on the budget—infrastructure, security, basic education, healthcare—against university demands is a perennial challenge, even in a high-revenue environment. Previous partial salary adjustments and engagements suggest dialogue has occurred, yet the gap between signed understandings and payroll reality has proved decisive in triggering action.
Alabi’s comments capture a note of exhaustion common in prolonged disputes: the willingness to end the strike immediately upon implementation signals that the goal is resolution rather than indefinite confrontation. Whether that resolution comes through executive approval of domestication, payment of arrears, clearer structuring of the Lagos Factor, or a fresh negotiated package will determine how quickly LASU, LASUED, LASUSTECH, and LASUCOM return to normal operations.
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As of early October 2026, the institutions remain closed to full academic activity. Students await clarity, lecturers insist on the letter of the 2025 agreement plus local cost-of-living adjustments, and the Lagos State Government faces pressure to convert stated intentions into tangible payroll and policy outcomes. The episode underscores a recurring Nigerian higher-education dilemma: national agreements require state-level ownership and funding to take root, and delays exact a heavy price on the next generation of professionals in the country’s economic nerve centre.
Samuel O. Sulaimon is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of Naijapiz. He covers News, Sports, Finance, Faiths, Education, Technology.
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