OAU transport Crisis: ERC Calls for a Student Congress and Mass Protest!
Students’ union should reach out to staff unions and university members for joint actions
Great Ife. The transport crisis on OAU campus, artificially induced by the management, requires a bold action from the students, staff and University community members. Despite the 72-hour lecture boycott by students, the Prof. Bamire-led university management has refused to yield to the demand of students that both the commercial buses from Ife town (Town-Igboro) and the university-managed new campus shuttle buses should operate together on campus.
Consequently, we call on the students’ union leadership to call a student congress with a view to taking step for the next line of action. For us in the Education Rights Campaign (ERC), we call for a Peaceful Mass Protest backed with media action. This is necessary, given that the management has become insensitive to the plights of students, staff and university community people, possibly because those who make the policy do not use commercial transport system.
In taking the next line of action, we enjoin the students’ union to reach out to, and invite staff unions including NASU, ASUU, SSANU, NAAT and CONUA to the Congress. The union should also mobilise other university community members including marketers’ association. This step is necessary given that the transport crisis affects not only students but also staff and other members of the community. Furthermore, involving others affected will defeat any attempt of the management to isolate the students.
The demand for Town-Igboro buses to coexist with campus shuttle buses should not be difficult to implement, if the management does not have hidden agenda. While the Town-Igboro buses operate directly from inside campus to Ife town, university-managed shuttle buses will operate within the campus environment up to university entrance/exit gates. This will greatly reduce pressure on Town-Igboro buses, as a good number of students only commute between campus and gate. Also, this will allow for flexibility in transport system because the shuttle buses will be able to operate in different areas on campus including academic and staff quarters areas.
However, if the university management has a better alternative to this arrangement, it should publicly present it. To this end, we enjoin the students’ union leadership to invite officials of the university management, especially those in charge of the transport system, to the Congress. To us, running a university should not be rocket science. Through democratic engagements and consultation in decision-making, many of these crises can be addressed and managed easily.
We however call on union leadership not to compromise the interest of students in the name of consultation. Consequently, we call on students to use the Congress to also address other welfare issues affecting them, including extortion and exploitation at faculties and department, and worsening living conditions in the hostels.
Finally, we call on students to demand adequate hostel facilities on campus to reduce the stress students go through to attend to academic activities. If students have to spend a significant time on commuting to and from campus to town, how can they perform optimally. However, such hostel facility should be built and operated by the university and not private business people, who use students’ plights to make profits without providing adequate services.
OGUNJIMI ISAAC,
DEPUTY NATIONAL CORDINATOR
ADARAMOYE MICHAEL LENIN,
NATIONAL MOBILIZATION OFFICER.
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The Education Rights Campaign (ERC) is a platform formed by activists and socialists to fight against attacks on students’ rights and welfare, and introduction of anti-student policies. We also fight for adequate funding and democratic management of public education. Join us in the struggle to save public education from collapse.
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