In Nigeria protesting students come up very frequently against the problem of expulsion, suspension and refusal to release exam results. Some have spent years battling the university authorities. In some cases the students have even been arrested and beaten. below we have the case of victimisation at UNILORIN (the University of Ilorin).
February 2003, makes it two years since the strike action embarked upon by the Academic Staff Union Universities (ASUU), University Of Ilorin branch, which progressed into the ASUU national strike action of April - June 2001, that later led to multiple cases of sackings and vicious attacks on the striking lecturers.
In all, about sixty lecturers suffered sackings, suspensions or demotion. Some of the lecturers were also forcefully ejected from the Staff Quarters without notice. This developments is the peak of victimisation at the University Of Ilorin, where student activists, as well as workers, have faced unrelenting repression from the Unilorin Authorities, which was particularly widespread during the notorious reign of the recent Vice-chancellor, Prof. S. Oba Abdulraheem.
Similarly, the repression of genuine student activists equally peaked during the period under review. Numerous cases of such victimization include framed up allegations; trumped up charges cum arrests and incarceration; expulsion and endless withholding of final statement of results - some for as long as five years after graduation.
Notable cases include the expulsion of Tosin Akinrogunde, Hammed Balogun and Kayode Mogbojuri - all expelled in March 2002. Also worthy of mention are the cases of Rasheedat Adeshina and Lanre Akinola - both have had their final/graduation results withheld for about five years running.
Tosin Akinrogunde, a final year medical student, was expelled on trumpedup allegations linked to the campaign against increment in school fees way back in May 1999. This renewed attack on Tosin, who had earlier suffered all manners of victimization including incarceration and previous expulsion, came at a time when the sacking of some Medical Lecturers by the UNILORIN Authorities was particularly biting hard in the Medical Faculty. Apparently sensing the restiveness of the moment among the students the Oba Abdulraheem-led Administration delivered the expulsion order on Tosin to checkmate the brewing mood against the sacking of the lecturers. More illogical and annoying in the whole exercise is the fact that Tosin had earlier been discharged of the same allegations by the Magistrate's Court back in the year 2001!
The Federal High Court of Ilorin, on November 2, 2002, declared the expulsion null and void, and had subsequently granted a Perpetual Injunction restraining the Authorities from victimizing Tosin on the basis of the aforementioned allegations and expulsion order. However, the Authorities refused to obey the court order; and a case of contempt of court is pending at the Law Courts. This has gone a long away to show the inherent limitation of the courts. The ruling class will do anything to undermine the authority of the so-called "rule of law" if it does not go their way, but will continue to preach the sanctity of the rule of law and of the courts to the workers and the ordinary people in society.
Another related development is the callous continual withholding of the graduation results of Lanre Akinola and Rasheedat Adeshina four years after leaving University. They were both past members of the Students' Representative Council and the Executive Council of the Students' Union respectively. In spite of earlier intervention by the courts via a positive judgement since 1999 on the matter, there has been no respite for them . Similarly, an intervention from the office of the Special Adviser to the President on Education has been treated with ignominy. Also being ignored are numerous resolutions by the students' body calling for the release of their results.
In the same light, Hameed Balogun and Kayode Mogbojuri are presently under expulsion, basically because of their uncompromising activism in the past. They were both framed up for offences allegedly committed in October 2001 during a student protest against Security Personnel harassment on campus. In order to get them implicated, their Student ID Cards were criminally reproduced by the University Security men, while falsely claiming that the students had lost their ID cards that are supposed to have fallen to the ground during the protest. They brazenly claim this even when it is common knowledge that the tow were miles away when the protest occurred.
All this, notwithstanding the fact that there was an understanding between the Students' Union, on behalf of the two, and the School Administration, way back in June 2002, that immediately after the two would withdraw their case from the Law Court, they would subsequently be recalled. But eight months after withdrawing their case from court they are yet to be reinstated! Such is the deceit of the gentlemen of the Ivory Tower.
In view of the above, it is obvious that only a concerted struggle will resolve the multiple cases of victimisation at UNILORIN. The agitation must be unrelenting; the struggle must remain principled and mass orientated. In this light the 2003 ASUU strike action over the sacked lecturers at Ilorin is commendable, but the struggle must equally have an internal character, with the agenda of mobilising the UNILORIN community as well in the struggle against victimisation and campus autocracy.
May 2003