The national alumni of the Ladoke Akintola University of Technology, LAUTECH, Ogbomoso has condemned the action of “a section of the students who went on rampage and distastefully displayed the obituary of a living Vice-Chancellor.”
The association described the action as barbaric and a display of poor character.
This is just as the association advised the Federal Government to take over the ownership of the University in the events that the visitors continue to show lack of financial capacity to run the University.
Earlier this week, apart from denying access to students writing the unified tertiary matriculation examinations, UTME, some students of the institution displayed a mock obituary poster of the VC, Prof. Adeniyi Gbadegesin, as a way of expressing their displeasure towards the lingering crisis in the school.
For years, the inability of the owner states of Oyo and Osun to pay salary of workers of the institution has crippled smooth academic exercise.
Only last year, workers’ unions in the university were on strike for more than 7 months. The unions, last week issued another threat of industrial action, following what they called the failure of government to honour the agreement it had with them before they shelved the last industrial action.
At a press conference in Osogbo, the Osun State capital, the association’s National public relations officer, Samson Owoyokun, apologised “to the candidates, JAMB Management and the entire public on the untold hardship and embarrassment the action might have caused them.
The association also urged the national leader of the All Progressives Congress, APC, who is the institution’s chancellor, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, “to as a matter of urgent duty, intervene in the matter by facilitating a meeting with the visitors to the University with a view to finding a permanent solution to the crisis rocking the University.”
Owoyokun said the call became necessary “in furtherance of its efforts to find a permanent solution to the challenges facing the institution,” adding that “the association understands that the students’ action was borne out of frustration due to the effect of the strike action on their future.”
The statement reads further: “The Alumni Association strongly believes that the white paper on the report of the visitation panel submitted to the Government on 10th February, 2017 should have been completed. It therefore requests that the white paper on the panel be made public without any further delay.
”We appeal to the owner-state governors to pay all the outstanding subventions owed the institution which is over N7 Billion and commence regular payment of monthly subventions as and when due.
“We therefore seize this opportunity to express our unalloyed support for the University Management under the leadership of the Vice-Chancellor, Professor Adeniyi Sulaiman Gbadegesin, for performing exceedingly well in managing the affairs of the University, and earnestly pray that he lives long to enjoy the fruits of his labour in good health and wealth,” the statement added.
