₦airaland Forum

JOINT PRESS STATEMENT OF SOCIALIST AND LEFT ORGANISATIONS (DSM, PACESETTERS MOVEMENT AND SYL) OF OBAFEMI AWOLOWO UNIVERSITY, ILE-IFE:
13th November, 2015
WE CONDEMN AND REJECT THE CHOICE OF SENATOR BABAJIDE OMOWORARE AS SPEAKER IN THE FORTHCOMING GANI FAWEHINMI PUBLIC LECTURE (2ND EDITION)
Our attention has been drawn, in the Socialist and Left Organisations (Comprising of DSM, Pacesetters Movement and SYL), to a Public Lecture planned by the Central Executive Council (CEC) of Great Ife Students’ Union, and scheduled to hold on Thursday, 19th November on the campus of Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife. Senator Babajide Omoworare, the Senator representing Ife-Ijesa Senatorial District in the National Assembly, has been invited by the executives of the Students’ Union to join other distinguished human rights’ activists as speakers in this event. We condemn in strong terms the choice of Senator Babajide Omoworare as a speaker in the forthcoming programme. And we use this medium to advise the Senator not to bother showing up for the programme!
Omoworare not exhibited any pro-people or radical character worthy of earning him the pedigree to speak at a public lecture planned by a Students’ Union, talk less much of a lecture organised in honour of the Late Senior Advocate of the Masses, Chief Gani Fawehinmi. Our University, Obafemi Awolowo University, is by chance, located in the same Senatorial district that Senator Omoworare is representing in the National Assembly. But there has not been any time that Omoworare has openly argued or advanced the cause of the students, lecturers and staff of the University in the Nigerian Senate or the National Assembly at large. One would have expected that as a Senator in the opposition, in the year 2014, he would have called the attention of the Senate to the agitation of Great Ife Students against the outrageous increment in our fees. Like any other anti-people, careerist politician, Omoworare kept mute, and allowed Prof. Omole to force the increment down the throat of poor students. The disposition of Senator Omoworare towards the outrageous increment in fees of Great Ife students in 2014 was in clear contradistinction to the attitude of Federal parliamentarians in South Africa towards the # FEESMUSTFALL protest, led by students of Witwaterstrand University.
We are rest assured that the late Senior Advocate of the Masses (SAM), who would be remembered and honoured on November 19, would not have kept silence on a matter as critical as oppression of Nigerian youths, happening at his very backyard. We contend that inviting politicians like Omoworare to an anniversary in honour of Chief Gani Fawehinmi is like inviting Beelzebub to church, and an unpardonable dishonour to the legacies of Late Gani Fawehinmi. No Great Ife student that is committed to the radical tradition on which the union is built will allow that! In 1982, the Students’ Representatives Council (SRC) of our Union, unanimously conferred the award of Senior Advocate of the Masses on Chief Gani Fawehinmi in recognition of his bold and articulate advocacy for the liberation of the oppressed and suffering masses.
Please recall with us that Senator Jide Omoworare joined his other APC colleagues on the floor of the Senate to shut down a bill moved by Senator Philip Aduda that the Federal Government, as part of its campaign promises to Nigerians, should start payment of N5, 000 to unemployed youths in Nigeria. The APC senators embarrassingly shut down a motion of national importance as that, without engaging in any debate on it. While the APC as a party has reaffirmed its commitment to its manifestoes and campaign promises, the representatives of the APC in the Senate are not taking serious action on, or committed to critical points in the manifestoes of the party, on which many youths and masses voted both the executives and legislators elected under the platform of the party. We consider the conspiracy of these APC Senators as anti-youths and narrow- minded.
We fully support proposal for payment of allowance for Nigerian youths that are unemployed, because the problem of unemployment is largely caused by the ineptitude of successive governments and politicians in Nigeria, who invest in nothing other than corruption and oil. However, we believe that the Buhari government should not use the payment of N5, 000 stipends as an excuse not to fund education with 26% budgetary allocation of the 2016 budget. We will equally resist any attempt to divert public funds on cosmetic projects that will benefit contractors and politicians, such as the “opon imo project” in Osun, which will have little or no substantial impact on youths and masses.
We fully commend and agree with commemorating the Late Gani Fawehinmi by the planning of a Public Lecture in honour of the late Senior Advocate of the Masses. But we do not think his memory should be insulted by the invitation of politicians with questionable character, or people without true allegiance to the Nigerian masses. In fact as Socialist and Left organisations, we are putting plans together to mobilise Nigerian youths for a protest in Osogbo on November 17, in commemoration of the International Students’ Day, and in agitation for some of the ideals that the late Senior Advocate spent most of his adult life fighting for. We however wish that Senator Omoworare will be reminded of the protest and popular rejection that greeted the visitation of Former President Jonathan to our campus in November 2014. As Left organisations, we are committed to giving honour to courageous people, who are truly committed to liberation of the people.
Signed,
Wole Olubanji (Engels) General Secretary, Democratic Socialist Movement (DSM)
Sanyaolu Juwon Chairman, Pacesetters Movement
Abiodun Idris (Banjris) Coordinator, Socialist Youth League (SYL)