Democratic Socialist Movement

For Struggle, Solidarity and Socialism in Nigeria

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By - DSM

EDUCATION RIGHTS CAMPAIGN (ERC): OLABISI ONABANJO UNIVERSITY (OOU) NEED TO STRUGGLE

SUFFERING OF OLABISI ONABANJO UNIVERSITY’S (OOU) AGO IWOYE STUDENTS:

ONLY MASS STRUGGLE CAN GUARANTEE BETTER LEARNING CONDITIONS

Since the criminal hike in tuition fees, not a few students of Olabisi Onabanjo University (OOU), Ago Iwoye, Ogun State may have been left with options of either robbing a bank in order to afford the high fees or dropping out of school. The fees for fresh students, for instance, range from N190,000 to N390,000. These are well beyond the capacity of many students from the working people background. Sadly, those who have managed to pay the high fees are presently learning under terrible conditions due to worsening standard of living brought about by the harsh economy, inadequate access to academic materials, poor infrastructure among other issues bordering on inadequate funding by the state government, being experienced within the four campuses across the state including Ibogun, Sagamu and Ikenne. This is despite the recent over a 100% increment in school fees, which is not commensurate with the services being provided by the university management.

This has brought to serious questioning the arguments by the school management and the Ogun state government that the hike in fees were to, in part, enable the management improve the learning and welfare conditions on the campuses and meet her obligation to both staff and students. However, in reality, the learning and welfare conditions of both staff (save for the top echelon!) and the students remain largely abysmal. The extortionate fees paid by the students don’t reflect their material condition on campus. This is why the Education Rights Campaign (ERC) demands democratic management in the running of the university, involving elected representatives of staff unions, students and the host community, to jointly decide how “scarce resources” are expended and managed.

One would like to mention that OOU students do face issues like inadequate facilities like congested/inadequate lecture theaters, leading to lecturers’ offices being used for lectures in various faculties, especially departments with low students’ intakes.

Also worthy of mention is lack of up-to-date university library with modern equipment such as 3D printers, VR, multimedia resources, internet services and others. Students of Olabisi Onabanjo University (OOU) do oftentimes have to travel to other university libraries like University of Ibadan (UI), Obafemi Awolowo University (OAU) among others, risking their lives and expending scarce resources to source academic materials.

Added to this is the chronic underfunding of the university health facilities as sick students are sent out to pharmacies in Ago Iwoye and environs to go purchase basic items like syringes for injections, drips and common drugs for their treatments. The truth is that the school clinic is understaffed and poorly equipped. Ironically, the school health fee was also hiked and in addition, the students were also compelled to pay Health/Medical insurance, whose benefits and services are completely missing at the clinic.

The Olabisi Onabanjo University (OOU), being an non-residential institution, is one where students reside in adjoining communities miles away from the campuses and so one would have expected adequate provision of transportation, democratically run and managed at the lowest minimal cost to the students. Rather the school authorities and the state government, true to their profit-first philosophy, have left the students at the mercies of profiteer transporters who increase fares arbitrarily every now and then while the school management simply watch. The authorities are only compelled to intervene when the students decide to protest the extortionate hikes.

In some instances, students are forced to trek kilometers due to this incessant transport hikes to either school and their residencies. The OOU campuses lack adequate sporting facilities, yet the school authorities collect levies for sports from the students without providing facilities for the physical education training and recreation. Modern stadiums with outdoor and indoor facilities like soccer pitches, track and field lanes, volleyball court, table tennis, lawn tennis, swimming pool etc. are hard to come by at the campuses of OOU!

Also, there is no proper academic calendar in OOU. A case in point, one would recall, was in 2023 where four (4) academic semesters were conducted in one session! There was no time for lecturers to expand on topics as they had to meet up with one hour in a week for topics and one month to complete a whole load of curriculum! Students were denied adequate time for study and couldn’t expand their knowledge properly in a given course/topic as they were completely overloaded with academic works, and practically spent half of their days on campuses to prepare for the “impromptu” examination! This is against the background of poor and effective transport system, which meant that the students had to trek home late into the evening, with all the risks and danger that implies.

All these underscore the need for proper and adequate funding of the public university system by the government, with massive investment in the provisions of halls of residence, spacious and ventilated lecture theaters with modern sound system, a well stocked library with books and internet facility and other gadgets to enhance learning and research, provision of sporting facilities for physical training exercises and recreation, adequate health facilities among others, at little or no cost to students. However, due to the anti-poor and neo liberal policies of the Gov. Dapo Abiodun-led government, all these would be a mirage, unless the mass of OOU students are prepared to organize and engage in mass actions to demand from the state government and the school management the provisions of these amenities.

We in the Education Right campaign (ERC) OOU branch hereby calls on students to join us in building and organizing with a view to struggle against the poor learning environment and to demand adequate and proper funding of the education system to meet the obligation of an efficient academic service delivery to the students, and proper working and welfare conditions to both academic and non-academic staffs of the institution. For us in the ERC, proper funding of public education is a right and not a privilege. We also believe Nigeria is rich enough to provide free and functional public education at all levels. The only reason why this is not so is capitalism and corruption. This is why we support the need for a linkage between the struggle to defend public education and the building of a mass movement to overthrow capitalism and enthrone a Socialist Nigeria.

OUR DEMANDS:

  • We call on Ogun State Government to adequately fund all public tertiary institutions across the state especially OOU.
  • We call for adequate and low cost transportation system for ease of movements within and outside the campuses.
  • We call for provision of modern learning facilities including libraries, lecture theaters, halls of residence etc.
  • We call for the immediate downward review of the hiked fees and the provisions of learning and living grants to students to ease the present economic hardships.
  • We call for the democratic management and control of OOU by the elected representatives of staff unions, students and host community.
  • We call for an independent and democratically-run students’ union devoid of school management and state government influence.
  • We call for payment of all unpaid salaries and allowances to both academic and non academic staffs.

If you agree with the above, please join us.

Email: [email protected]