TRUTH BE SAID

Yester-years, precisely, during Olusegun Obansanjo’s 1979 military regime, there was a serious conflict of ideology between the bourgeoising military elite and one pen-soldier ‘Arthur Nwankwor’. This tussle however polarized academicians’ ranks between those who loves their dare lives and never mind worshiping the military cadre for it, and other ‘radicals’ who also never mind loosing theirs in defense of what they believe. This hinted debate lasted and later mid-wifed the book “Before I Die” written by this pen martyr (Arthur Nwankwor) who suspected that the world may never know about the ‘other side’ of OBJ and Nigeria debt to World Bank if he never act fast by penning it down as his life already labeled for destruction by the-power-that-be can come to a mysterious end anytime. The detail of the fight between the duos is another day subject of discussion but one outstanding thing from this power/ideology clash is that majority of Nigeria leaders hate to be told where they have faulted. Thus, they consequently surround themselves with praise-singers; mostly mediocre.

But briefly, the fight is all about Arthur asking why the country should go burrowing from the International Monetary Fund IMF against the wish of entire Nigerian and against the recommendation of the committee setup by the Head of State himself, thus, OBJ felt dared and smirched for a mare Nigerian asking why his Alfa & Omega decision to borrow from IMF should be questioned by anybody. Meanwhile, Arthur argued that if there is even any need to borrow, it will be more rational to collect a little from our foreign reserve since we already have a stable economy and enough surpluses in our foreign reserve. This borrowing form IMF by OBJ Administration later turned to be the genesis of Nigeria currency devaluation and prognosis of our unending economic crisis.

As the ASUU strike surge, our dear President seemed more concerned with habouring praise-singers than tackling issues being criticize headlong. Thus, the falcons and falconers now becomes enemies just as the battle seem to have been shifted from Presidency/FG to National Association of Nigeria Students NANS; turning the battle to be NANS vs ASUU

Few days ago, I was told that the ASUU Chairman of UNILAG Dr. Oghenekaro Ogbinaka had in an interview with a Punch correspondent said the bitter truth about NANS President Comr. Yinka Gbadebo which may be daring. I only gave a divided attention listening ear as I ain’t recently much interested in NANS politicking.

In the said interview, when the Punch correspondent asked Dr. Oghenekaro Ogbinaka “NANS says it is no longer supporting ASUU in the strike. Is this not an indication that the union has lost one of its strong allies in this struggle?” he was quoted to have answered “The tragedy of this nation is that we killed leadership at the students’ level. The government penetrated the students’ body and destroyed it. We are aware that the President of NANS was rusticated about 10 years ago from the Ekiti State University. He appeared at the Obafemi Awolowo University where he got admitted for a diploma programme in Local Government Studies in order to qualify him to seek election as NANS President. Now we have a Diploma Student representing NCE, OND, HND, Bachelors students as their leader. The painful thing is that most students, even at OAU, Ife, do not know the President of NANS. It is doubtful if he has a regular matriculation number, knows his course adviser and fellow students. He runs NANS from the comfort of a hotel in Abuja. Our prayer is that the strike will be over, those parading themselves as NANS leaders will be back to school, and journalists will be able to locate them in their various hostels and classrooms if they are genuine students. We know our students and our students know us. These NANS people may be students but not Nigerian undergraduates”

Days later on, I noticed an unexpected post in Yinka’s Facebook Wall, the post was simple but funny. It reads “My Name: Adeyinka Gbadebo. School: Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile/Ife, Osun State. Course: Local Government Studies. Matric Number: DLG/2011/207 and ended with a surprise rhetoric question “What else do you need?”

I tried endlessly to decipher the rationale behind such post until when the debate started heating the social media unendingly. It was then that I perceive that Yinka was responding to UNILAG ASUU Chairman Interview.

As if the there is a sinew sting on Yinka’s psyche, he decided to make an elaborate rejoinder on 17th Oct, 2013 which he captioned “The hypocrisy of ASUU and the dilemma of Dr. Ogbinaka of UNILAG in his inordinate desperacy to circumvent truth and assassinate decorum”.

Read details here: http://www.naijacenter.com/nans-politicized-jonathan-administration-detriment-nigerian-students/

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