FROM THE LEADERSHIP OF THE UNION
Equity and Unity are the foundation; love, courage, wisdom and trust
are pillars upon which a just society rests. On the 25th August, 2014 by
4pm, the leadership of the union summoned a meeting of the heads of
departments, faculties, religious and other associations to give
detailed report, evaluate and seek the yearnings and opinions of their
students on how best to further approach the struggle at this critical
moment of our history as they are the closest to the students they
represent from their respective organization.
The very essence of
the meeting is to incorporate all structures on campus as we embark on
another phase of the struggle because if attention is given to unity and
no affection is given to diversity, our world will experience true
peace and progress.
After a detailed verbal report was given by the
president of the union which was as communicated to the entire Great IFE
students in the official release of the union on 24th Aug, 2014 titled
“WELCOME BACK:THE GREAT ARMY OF COURAGE!”, the leaders spoke one after
the other and debated the issues critically and the following are their
resolved positions:
1. Massive payments made by stale students
weakened the struggle and the strength of union leaders in executing it
of which started before late registration threat of the management when
finalist were paying because of the fear of not securing special
electives and accommodation while the union leaders staked their
studentship in fighting for students of which the students didn’t
solidarized by complying with the None Payment directives given by their
leaders to give the struggle a strong leverage.
2. The leaders
frowned at the congresses called by the leadership of the union that led
to the last set of protests lamenting that they were not
representational of their students’ interests but that were peopled and
hijacked by certain interests not in tandem with the generality of OAU
students.
3. In view of the above, the leaders demanded that more of
such meetings of heads of faculties, departments, religious bodies and
other associations should frequently be called instead of congress, or
better still call for referendum to test the true feelings of the
majority of the students.
4. The leaders reiterated that their
students won’t welcome any further protest or related actions that are
capable of the academic calendar, but enjoined that other effective
diplomatic mechanisms should be employed.
5. The leadership of the
union should concentrate more on the freshmen fees to get it reduced
further and get the management committed to the implementation of
instalmental payment and other relief programs.
6. The challenging
in court of those of us put under suspension order of rustication and
the re-instatement of those suspended should be facilitated in due
course.
However the leadership of the union whom are obliged to
represent, amplify and magnify the good interest of the entire Great IFE
students irrespective of prevailing circumstances such as threat of
termination of their studentship by university management shall continue
the struggle based on the opinions/wishes of the majority and strongly
demur, decry and frown at the targeted victimization of students.
Conclusively, a letter was sent to the university management on 28th
August, 2014 to request for the extension of normal registration of
which in response to our request late registration has now been extended
to 5th September 2014 for all students to have the opportunity of
registering.
La lucha sigue... !
Signed
Shittu I. Olatayo
Secretary-General Ibikunle Isaac M. President.
