By LANRE AROGUNDADE
The period between the late 1980s and the early 1990s could rightly be described as major turning point in the struggle against authoritarianism on campuses and brutal military dictatorship in the larger society.
In the aftermath of the 1989 anti-SAP (Structural Adjustment Programme) protests spearheaded by students and urban youths, the military regime of Ibrahim Babangida was firm in its decision to trample upon the right to independent students unionism and was desperate to have allies across the campuses.
It should be recalled that part of the fall out of that protest was the decision of that regime to weaken students unionism by all means possible including making it voluntary to dismantle the financial foundation and consciously sponsoring terrorist attacks against radical and revolutionary students activists.
Further armed with native intelligence, wit, wisdom and oratorial prowess, it was not long before the students populace came to terms with the fact that an Emperor has ascended the students’ union leadership.
It was at this historical juncture in the 1989/90 session that Adeola Akeem Soetan got elected as the president of the University of Ife students’ union with a program to strongly defend the right to independent students’ unionism, non-commercialised education, and improved welfare and academic conditions for students.
Show, as some of us has called him for decades, was not only armed with this radical programme, he was equally weaponised by the revolutionary ideas of Marxism and socialism that define campus agitations withing the context of the larger struggle to liberate the Nigerian masses from exploitative strangle hold of the exploiting capitalist classes.
Further armed with native intelligence, wit, wisdom and oratorial prowess, it was not long before the students populace came to terms with the fact that an Emperor has ascended the students’ union leadership.
What was consequently witnessed was the best traditions of Aluta for which the Great Ife campus was renowned. However, this was apparently to the distaste of the campus authorities and their military backers outside.
For a students’ union president that was as popular as Show, the only way they thought they could do this was through the sponsorship of campus cultists who through popular mobilisation were however often pegged back.
But the cultists were back in full force when the Great Ife students’ union decided in the 1990/91 session to call a rally to press home the demand of the National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS) for the payment of N2000 bursary to students. Show was by this time no longer the president but the union through the then Public Relations Officer, Sam Ebun Olu-Adegboruwa (Big Sam) reached out to him to bring his popularity to bear on the mobilisation.
What followed was a macabre turn of events which saw cultists boldly attempting to scuttle the planned protest. In the end there were clashes during which at least one of the cultists died.
The development became a perfect excuse to get Show and others arrested on trumped up murder charge, which led him to being detained along with others at Ilesa prisons for seven months as he regained freedom in January 1991.
The incident that led to his detention however shook the Nation so much so that the Dr. Beko Ransome Kuti led Committee for the Defence of Human Rights (CDHR) had to institute an independent probe that led to the publication titled: ‘When Students Kill Students’, which exposed the state backing for the campus cultists.
The Unife authorities constantly hounded Show with repeated expulsions that meant that he had to spend thirteen years on campus even though he ought to have earned his degree in Agricultural Science within a five-year period.
The delayed graduation never for once dampened the revolutionary enthusiasm of Show and it is to his credit that after the campus he teamed up with other change seeking elements in the pro-democracy, trade union, human rights and socialist movement, the later as a member of the Democratic Socialist Movement.
Thank you Show for your courage and consistency in the struggle to make Nigeria a true giant of Africa.
Show has also been active in the agitations and campaigns for an alternative political movement of the working masses and their allies and thus was once the Chairman of the Ogun State chapter of the Gani Fawehinmi led National Conscience Party (NCP) while being one of the inspirational figures behind the registration of the Socialist Party of Nigeria (SPN).
Show has equally been a leading advocate of credible and inclusive elections using the platform of Democracy Vanguard.
What many may not know is that Show is also a journalist having worked with the Nigerian Television Authority (NTA) prior to his undergraduate studies at Great Ife. Thus, if Show writes so prolifically and regularly makes informed, exciting and entertaining commentaries on national and public interest issues, it is the journalistic part of him on display.
Thank you Show for your courage and consistency in the struggle to make Nigeria a true giant of Africa.
Congratulations on your 60th birthday.
