islamabad - International Islamic University (IIUI) Academic Staff Association (ASA) on Thursday announced to initiate a large-scale protest against the administration on non-inclusion of teachers’ representative in Board of Governors (BoG).

The association held a press conference against the university administration’s discriminatory behaviour with teachers and demanded to change the ‘bureaucratic’ model of the university into a democratic one. The ASA also announced to oppose the university’s BoG meeting until the insertion of teachers’ representative in the body.

ASA President Prof Dr Abdul Jalil, General Secretary Shehzad Ashraf Chaudhry, Vice President Dr Faizur Rehman and others held the press conference.

Speaking on this occasion, Dr Jalil said that the teachers’ body has decided that no more BoG meetings without teachers’ representation would be allowed to be convened. “We may convene an election for different positions in the decision-making bodies and would resist any meeting with full force,” the ASA president said.

The teachers’ body also announced that it will soon start a large-scale protest inside the campus and boycott the classes and examination if the demands were not met.

“ASA will not participate in the admission process for Fall 2017,” he said.

Dr Jalil also said that ASA will also write letters to President, Prime Minister, ministers, and Chief Justice of Pakistan and will seek help from the Federation of All Pakistan Universities Academic Staff Association against this discrimination.

Dr Rehman said that the association strived for the representation of elected faculty members in the BoG, Board of Trustees (BoT), academic council and other decision-making bodies of IIUI as per Higher Education Commission (HEC) rules. After rigorous efforts of ASA, the case was partially agreed by BoG which approved one slot for the academic community as its representative in the body.

The BoG’s approved agenda was further presented in BoT in the meeting held on April 17. However, the BoT deferred the case to seek HEC’s opinion and study the practices of other universities.

The BoT was called with the main agenda of granting the teaching community of IIUI the right of elected representation in the BoG. “We believe it is just a delaying tactic because all universities except IIUI are having their representation and it is known to all Pakistan,” he said.

Dr Rehman also said that in the last 10 years only three BoT meetings were convened, while it is obligatory to convene a meeting per year.