The former governor of Osun State, Prince Olagunsoye Oyinlola has said his administration did not cede the ownership of the Ladoke Akintola University of Technology (LAUTECH) to Oyo State as claimed by a former Oyo State governor, Chief Adebayo Alao Akala at the weekend.
Akala had been quoted by the media as claiming that he had secured the sole ownership of the university from the Oyinlola government before he left in 2010 blaming his own successor in Oyo State for not following up on his achievement in that regard.
But Prince Oyinlola, in a statement he issued from Okuku, his hometown on Sunday said probably Akala had forgotten that his (Oyinlola’s) government) took the Oyo State government to the Supreme Court in July 2010 asking the apex court to reaffirm the joint ownership of the University by the two states.
“That case was still on by the time I exited government in November 2010. Indeed, the Supreme Court in March 2012 in a judgment delivered by the then Chief Justice of Nigeria, Justice Dahiru Musdapher, upheld the joint ownership of LAUTECH by the two states.
“While the case was on, and two months before I left government, and in order to protect the interests of the suffering students and workers of the university, the National Universities Commission (NUC) set up a seven-man committee headed by Prof. Chiedu Mafiana, a Director, at the NUC, to oversee the affairs of the university due to certain unilateral actions taken by the Oyo state government which were the subjects of the case at the Supreme Court. The committee was in charge of the school by the time I left office in November 2010.
“It goes without saying that my government which went to the Supreme Court could not have at the same time ceded the subject of dispute (LAUTECH) to the defendants in the case. There was no ceding of the institution to Oyo state. Perhaps I should also say that Osun state under me did not default once in meeting its financial obligations to the university throughout our years in government despite the crisis ignited by the attempt by Oyo state to forcibly chase Osun state out of the joint ownership,” Oyinlola said.
He, however, appealed to stakeholders of the institution, including the two state governments to show greater commitment to ending the suffering of students of the university and their parents.
