ERC Condoles with NANS and Students
The death of the Senate President of the National
Association of Nigerian Students (NANS) Donald Onukaogu Sunday, Dimeji Azeez
(a.k.a Fagbocious) and three others is indeed shocking. Reportedly, they died
in an auto crash while on their way to the University of Uyo to intervene in
the on-going crisis in the University which has also cost the live of at least
one student during protest against anti-poor policies of the University
administration. Their bus collided with a lorry. Seven others who were
critically injured are receiving treatment at a hospital.
We condole with the families of the deceased, NANS
leadership and entire Nigerian students. We hold the Management of the
University of Uyo responsible for their death. If not for the anti-poor
policies of the UNIUYO administration and the killing of protesting students,
they would not have embarked on that ill-fated journey. It is only fitting for
UNIUYO management to now immediately reverse all its criminal anti-student
policies that has caused not only the death of one of its students, Kingsley a
200 level Geology student, but also five
leaders of NANS.
The recurrent news of killings of students has become
worrisome. This year alone, nearly10 students have been either killed or
injured in one institution after the other in extra-judicial circumstances. All
of these deaths have occurred either as a result of police shooting at
protesting students or through other forms of extra-judicial killings. We will
recall the public's mind to just some of them.
On 25 February 2013, four students of Nassarawa State
University were killed while protesting against water scarcity and power
outage. About 17 students were arrested while the University was shut.
Two days after on February 28 2013, Seyi Fasere, a 400 level
student of the Ekiti State University was shot dead by police. He had gone to
his hometown Ilupeju to collect his tuition and on his way back, the bus
conveying him ran into armed robbers at Oye Ekiti. The driver veered off the
road while all occupants disembarked and fled into the bush. Several minutes
after the armed robbers had left, police came, combed the bush and found Seyi
Fasere hiding like all others. However, the N100,000 he had collected from his
parents for his school fees was found on him and this as far as the Police were
concerned was enough evidence that he was an armed robber. He was taken to the
police station and shot dead by a police man notoriously known as "Akobi
Esu" (Devil's Firstborn).
On 27 May 2013, Ahmed Dayo, an ND 1 student in the
Department of Accounting of the Kwara State Polytechnic, was shot inside a cab
by Police men escorting a bullion van belonging to a first generation bank.
Reportedly the armed police escort stopped the taxi and attempted to shoot its
tyre because it was getting too close to the bullion van. Unfortunately,
instead of the bullet hitting the tyre, it hit Dayo in the vehicle and damaged
one of his legs.
Likewise on the same 27 May 2013, Ibrahim Momodu, a student
of the University of Benin (UNIBEN) was shot dead by CSP Carol Afegbai, the
Divisional Police Officer of Ogida division.
The latest police killing occurred on Wednesday June 12
2013, and was the reason the NANS Senate president and his entourage met their
own death. kingsley, a 200 level Geology student of the University of Uyo
(UNIUYO) was shot dead by police during protest against inadequate lecture
spaces, extortionate fees and hike in the fare of the University campus
shuttle. About 45 students have also been arrested.
It is unfortunate that NANS response to some of these
mishaps has mostly been weak and uncoordinated thus allowing the police and
government to get away with these crimes. Not in one of the aforementioned
killings has justice been done or any positive results heard from series of
investigations promised by the government.
Yet the cause of most of these mindless death of students is
government anti-poor education policies which it wants to ram down our throat
whether we like it or not. It is these same anti-poor education policies,
together with bad roads, that constitute the circumstances surrounding the
unfortunate death of Donald Onukaogu Sunday, Dimeji Azeez and three others in
an auto crash.
There is no better way to honour the departed than for their
death to be made an occasion to launch a campaign against police killing of
students, the bad roads that is claiming lives daily as well as anti-poor
education policies that are denying the youths a future. Instead of the usual
verbose threats and media vituperations often issued by NANS anytime disasters
like this occur, this unfortunate incident has to be a clarion call on NANS
leadership to sit up.
We therefore call on the NANS leadership to immediately
declare a day of action to honour the departed. Such a day of action which
should involve lecture boycott and mass protest on all campuses nationwide
should be used to protest against government anti-poor education policies,
police brutality and extra judicial killing of students.
Hassan
Taiwo Soweto
National
Coordinator
1 comment:
Please, all the NANS, the story so far is very pathetic,
pls this brutality action by our unpitiable leadership must be stop by every means.
Abdulhammed Akibu.
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