The Public Relations Officer of the university, Mr. Abiodun Olarewaju, made this known on Sunday in a press statement.

He stated that the students’ group that proposed the lecture did not duly inform the university authorities of “the status and calibre of the invited guest until Friday, just a day before the scheduled programme.”

The university spokesperson emphasised that it was important to note that events involving high-profile personalities of Obi’s status required adequate prior notification to the university authorities.

The notice, he said, was to enable the institution to make necessary logistical and security arrangements, including proper liaison with relevant security agencies such as the Nigeria Police and the Department of State Services, DSS, in order to ensure the safety of the guest, members of the university community and the general public.

The spokesperson said consequently, given the short notice and the attendant inability to complete the critical arrangements, the university authorities could not approve the use of Oduduwa Hall for the event as requested by the organisers.

Olarewaju stated that the decision was taken purely in the interest of safety, orderliness and adherence to established protocols governing the use of university facilities, adding that it was not, “in any way, a reflection of disregard for the person or status of His Excellency, Peter Obi, whom the University holds in high esteem.”

He said the vice-chancellor of the university, Professor Adebayo Simeon Bamire was, and remained committed to supporting intellectual engagements and hosting distinguished personalities, provided that due process was followed and adequate notice was given.

“Members of the University community, students and the general public are therefore enjoined to always comply with laid-down procedures in planning events within the University because we all are partners in progress for the overall development of the University,” the spokesperson said.

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The post Why we didn’t allow Peter Obi lecture in our facility –OAU appeared first on Frontpageng.

The management of the institution announced the sudden passing of the students on Thursday in a release by its Public Relations Officer, Mr. Abiodun Olarewaju.

The institution stated that the unfortunate incident occurred during a clinical viva examination when the student reportedly complained of chest pain.

The university spokesperson said that the student was immediately attended to by his lecturers and fellow medical students present, “regretting that despite prompt medical attention and all efforts made to revive him, he sadly passed on.”

Olarewaju said the tragic loss had sent shockwaves through the university community.

He said the Vice-Chancellor, Professor Adebayo Simeon Bamire, on behalf of the Governing Council, Senate, staff, and students of the university, had extended heartfelt condolences to the parents, siblings, and the entire family of the deceased.

He also commiserated with his friends, colleagues, and members of the College of Health Sciences over this painful and irreparable loss.

The university management was said to be engaging relevant authorities and the family to provide necessary support and to further understand the circumstances surrounding the unfortunate incident.

The management prayed for the soul of the departed to rest in perfect peace.

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The post JUST IN: OAU loses medical student during clinical examination appeared first on Frontpageng.

Since I was oblivious of his ailment, I immediately reached for several numbers for confirmation after reading the Facebook post of acclaimed Newswatch and Tell Editor, Dare Babarinsa. It was as if I was in a trance. “This is shocking! Siyan gone???” Even when I knew Babarinsa would be the last person to peddle fake news, I still sought details.

Unfortunately, no one picked up raising my antenna until I called up Siyan’s son, Jide who gave me a load down of his father’s prolonged battles for survival. “He’s been ill for sometime now and died in Ibadan this morning and we are making plans to move his body to Ede for burial”, Jide retorted.

Sources at Ife Varsity (now Obafemi Awolowo University) where he was Pro-Chancellor and Chairman, Governing Council, revealed that he had surgery for brain tumor and underwent chemotherapy and was already showing signs of recovery when he kicked the bucket. He had earlier slumped at an event and was treated for stroke before it was discovered he had brain tumor, the sources offered.

An amiable friend and pioneer Jambite at Ife where he read History, Oyeweso was full of life. He was a highly resourceful academics evinced in his contributions to books, journals and newspaper articles. Siyan and I regularly shared thoughts on several issues.

We popped wine when he was appointed Pro-Chancellor and Chairman, Governing Council of Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile Ife, the first alumnus to get that mantle. He had taught at the Lagos State University (LASU) where he was head hunted as pioneer staff of Osun State University when History Scholar, Prof Sola Akinrinade was appointed Vice Chancellor.

Shortly after his appointment, we discussed the need to speed up the power project at the university which was conceived not only to provide electricity for the main campus and the Obafemi Awolowo University Teaching Hospital but also to some neighboring communities.

Our last engagement was occasioned by the controversial dress code by authorities at Ife Varsity for its students which broke in the last week of July. Like other alumni members who were critical of the move, I equally gave Siyan a piece of my mind,

“My sincere thought is that

1. The university management should avoid anything that will put it in direct confrontation with the students. The university has had almost two years of stability. I do not think it should embark on policies that will put that asunder. We need to sustain the very predictable academic calendar.
2. There are more pressing issues that should attract the focus of the university management than dress code.

*Boosting infrastructure to meet the demands of the students population – *improving/expanding the lecture halls and hostel facilities.

*provision of instructional/digital tools for learning,

*dealing squarely with admission quota and the issue of staff and huge students ratio.

*general welfare/wellbeing of staff and students.

*reaching out and striking a chord with the alumni particularly in Diaspora and other goodwill individuals to undertake specific projects. The university should outline a clear needs assessment where such persons can pick from rather than allow the university to be saddled with similar projects or those that are not immediately necessary.

*democratising conference opportunities (both within and outside the country). Or making the process more accessible.

3. It is in the best interest of the university to embark on campaign/counseling on the issue of dress code via different fora rather than engage in punitive measures which will be sorely counter productive.
4. We are also dealing with a Gen Z generation and need to be guided more by realism rather than a rigid attachment to moral platitudes. Please let’s be circumspect in pushing punitive policies that in the end will only inflame the campus.
5. It’s not impossible that some agent provocateurs within the university system and who were particularly opposed to your appointment as Council Chairman/Pro-Chancellor are angling to put a wedge between you and the students population. Please do not fall for the banana peel as a major confrontation with the students will not augur well for your tenure.”

Siyan was immensely grateful for my thoughts.

“Well received. Well thought out position. Immensely grateful my very dear brother.

Many thanks for the useful advise and guidance.

“May God continue to bless you and your household. Great Ife is a very difficult terrain. The best approach now is for the university to suspend the whole idea of a New dress Code” was his response.

And the matter of dress code was put in the cooler.

I was a bit agitated when my subsequent chats elicited no replies. I had thought Siyan was avoiding me after our verbal exchanges over the dress code. Unknown to me he was in an hospital in Lagos for several weeks battling in pains for his life.

The post Dirge as Siyan Oyeweso kicks the bucket, By Tony Iyare appeared first on Frontpageng.

Banji, myself and 23 others, including Taiye Oladapo, were pioneer members of our social club, The Krown Klub, Owo. While Banji was the Director of Finance and Taiye the Scribe or General Secretary, I was the Director of Public Relations. Ganiyu Banji ADEKUNLE was Number One on the club’s nominal roll, which was set out in alphabetical order.

In 1985 or thereabouts, Banji and I collaborated on a trading venture  – A & B Trading Concern – at his instigation, in line with his professional calling as an economist/banker. We started out using his father’s cocoa house building along Ogbon-Omo Street, Owo under the tutelage of Uncle Mike. May Uncle Mike’s soul continue to rest in peace! Both Uncle Mike and Banji shared many things in common: They were humble, courteous, humane and sympathetic to the plight of others.

Banji read Economics and later went on to work at Afribank, Ilesha branch, and afterwards at the Kwara state-owned Trade Bank in Lagos, facilitated, I believe, by Alhaji Jamiu Ekungba, who was Trade Bank’s Chief Inspector at some point. Taiye Oladapo also worked at Trade Bank.  On his relocation to Lagos, Banji lived with me (and Tola) at our 85, Kujore Street, Ojota residence; he came along with a friend of his, Odunayo, who is also gutted by Banji’s transition.

For reasons which I need not recount here, my interest in our joint business concern waned; especially with my  professional calling as a journalist taking me in a different direction from Banji’s keen interest in the business side of life. Banji made an exponential success of his business undertakings, such that if, today, he is reckoned with among the business moguls of Nigeria, it would have been well deserved. But the environment of business is unpredictable; it is one in which all things are not ceteris paribus, as the economists would say. Errors of omission and commission, factors beyond anyone’s control, and, above all, policy somersaults and regime change (the coming into power of Gen. Sani Abacha) adversely affected Banji’s business fortunes, confining him abroad for a lengthy period of time against his personal wishes and desires.

That enforced exile of many years adversely affected not just his business but also his family life, with his young family – Ladun and two-year-old Samuel, bearing the brunt.  What Banji passed through during this period is better imagined than experienced; but in this daunting adversity, his never-say-die spirit was not broken. Importantly, his faith in God grew over leaps and bounds – and that was what sustained him.

It was while in exile in the United Kingdom that he had his most profound and memorable experience with God. It was here that he got linked up with the giants of God like Dr. Morris Cerullo, a well noted American Pentecostal evangelist. It was also here that he wrote his impactful book titled “No Bankrupt in Zion.” He sent the manuscripts from London via courier service to me in Lagos to edit; after which I sent the edited work back to him.  You need to read the book to benefit from the nuggets encapsulated therein.

It was in this book that I learnt about his novel way of communing with God. Alone and lonely in foreign land where he had no family, no friend, and no adviser, he would arrange four seats and invite God the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit to take their seat. He would then sit on the fourth seat and begin to audibly present his petitions to the triune God as if he was seeing them! Believe you me, Banji said it worked!

It was also in Banji’s “No Bankrupt in Zion” that I first came across Alexis de Tocqueville, a brilliant French judge’s often-contested quotation in his book, “Democracy in America”, written in 1840, about the source of America’s power: “I sought for the greatness and genius of America in her commodious harbours and her ample rivers – and it was not there…In her fertile fields and boundless forests – and it was not there…In her rich mines and her vast world commerce – and it was not there… In her democratic Congress and her matchless Constitution – and it was not there. Not until I went into the churches of America and heard her pulpits aflame with righteousness did I understand the secret of her genius and power. America is great because she is good, and if America ever ceases to be good, she will cease to be great.”

In our prevailing circumstances in Nigeria, does that ring a bell? Little wonder, then, that the official motto of the United States of America is, “In God we trust”, which the US adopted in 1956, after it was signed into law by its 34th president, Dwight David Eisenhower. And it has since appeared on all U.S. currency. Before then, “E pluribus unum”, a Latin phrase which means “Out of many, one” was the de facto motto of the U. S., appearing on the Great Seal of the United States. Although it has been replaced by “In God we trust”, it still remains a prominent symbol of national unity.

A country’s motto – same thing as its national anthem – when carefully and thoughtfully chosen, and when it reflects its history, vision, and mission, is not treated with disdain or handled with levity and cannot be easily jettisoned. “E Pluribus unum” remains relevant to the U. S. which has forged one country or nation out of many diverse nationalities, and which continues to remind itself of the vision and mission of its fore-fathers and founders, the labours of its heroes past that must not be allowed to go down the drains or be taken in vain; and the duty that succeeding generations of leaders owe past, present, and future generations to keep that dream alive, despite the fact that, now and again, the faultlines of ethnic discrimination and, to a lesser extent, religious divide and economic inequalities, rear their ugly heads.

“In God we trust” reminds everyone that the US is not the touted “policeman of the world” just for the purpose of imposing and preserving “Pax Americana” for political, economic and military reasons, but it is also a nation of God with a mandate to defend God’s children wherever adversity may rise against them. President Donald Trump’s designation of Nigeria as a “Country of Particular Concern” in respect of alleged genocide against Christians by Islamic fundamentalists bears relevance here.

No Bankrupt in Zion’s Back of the Book summarised what Banji went through in exile: “Surely things could not get any worse! In debt, stranded in London without a work permit, forced to use a false name to obtain the most menial of work and separated from his family and friends, many of whom were detained without trial in Nigeria, was suicide the only answer? In desperation, and down to his last five pence, this one-time successful businessman turned to prayer. Would his prayer be answered and, if so, would the answer be the one he wanted? Only time will tell, but time does not appear to be on his side…”

It will not be out of place to expect someone who passed through what Banji experienced to be bitter and to apportion blame – but not Banji. Conversely, he was the one that was maligned by many! In the “Acknowledgements” to his book, Banji said he would, “against all expectations…sincerely give special thanks to those who consciously and unconsciously put pebbles, stones and hurdles on my path through life.”  Why? Because “without their knowing, they have made my life very exciting. I would possibly not have had problems big enough to cause me to release my affairs to the living God without this group of people.”

Nice talk! But tried as he did, Banji that came back from exile was not the same that went. Can we blame him? A man is the sum total of his experiences.  Until he breathed his last, Banji was, however, a minister of God and a dedicated family man. His book, “No Bankrupt in Zion”, speaks eloquently to these facts. He dedicated the book to “Ladun, my beloved wife, and Samuel, my son, who had just marked his second birthday when I set out on a supposed two-week journey that turned out to be a five-year absence from a loving family that I was expected to lead on the way of the Lord.” Five years when he wrote the book; five or so more years thereafter!

This much I know: Whatever anyone may say, Banji had a good heart. And I should know because we shared the same roof, like Bob Marley crooned. We slept on the same bed! We shared life-impacting moments! We dined and wined together, dipping our hands in the same pot! We carried the same ideas in our heart and the same ideals in our head. We walked naked before each other – and we were not ashamed!

Gani, go in peace! Sleep well, Banji! Enjoy the rest of your Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ! We shall meet again! Then, and only then, will you flash your inimitable smile again!

LAST WORD: Exactly 19 years ago this day 26th November, 2006 my mother changed mortality for immortality. Every thought of her passing opens wounds and brings back pains – what should have been and what were not! Why’s and How’s! But fond memories of a life sacrificially lived and an immeasurable love bestowed on all that crossed her path soothe the pains. I guess that is what it will always be. One day I hope to pull myself together to say a few words about my mother, FLORENCE OLUWAGBEMIGUN. Maybe this time next year, God willing! Till then, Iyemi le o!

*Bolawole (turnpot@gmail.com 0807 552 5533), former Editor of PUNCH newspapers, Chairman of its Editorial Board and Deputy Editor-in-chief, was also the Managing Director/ Editor-in-chief of the Westerner newsmagazine. He writes the “ON THE LORD’S DAY” column in the Sunday Tribune and “TREASURES” column in the New Telegraph newspapers. He is also a public affairs analyst on radio and television.

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The post Requiem for a friend and brother…, By Bola Bolawole appeared first on Frontpageng.

The university made this known in a statement signed and made available to newsmen on Sunday in Ile-Ife by its Public Relations Officer, PRO, Mr Abiodun Olarewaju.

Olanrewaju stated that the student, identified as Miss Dorcas Oseghale, of the Department of Chemistry with matriculation number: CHM/2021/165, was last seen around 8:00 p.m. on August 6, 2025.

According to him, Oseghale, who resides at Adesanmi House, Ibadan Road, Ile – Ife, reportedly went to buy food in front of the students’ village, along Ede Road axis of the university.

“When she did not return on time, her roommate made several attempts to reach her on phone but surprisingly, her two lines were not reachable.

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“At around 3:00 p.m on Aug. 7, 2025, a report of a missing female student was intercepted on a students’ social media platform.

“The security unit of the university started tracking the conversation around the incident.

“But around 6:10 p.m. on the same day, the case of a missing student was reported at the institution’s security unit by a group of students from the chemistry department.

“The group came in company of the roommate, Miss Akinkuade Omobolanle Beatrice, from the department of agricultural extension.

“Considering the complexity of the case, and its limitations in terms of human and material resources, the security unit decided to report its preliminary findings to the Police,” the PRO said.

Olanrewaju also said the Police had enough manpower with sound, professional and technical expertise to unravel the mystery surrounding the “disappearance” of the student for further investigations.

According to him, the Vice-Chancellor of the university, Prof. Adebayo Bamire, lauded the students of the university for being their brothers’ keeper.

“Bamire thanked them for the quick notice that one of them was missing and promptly reporting same to the appropriate quarters.

“The V-C appealed to the Police and other security agencies to do all within their power to help find the missing student,” he said

Source: NAN

The post Missing student: OAU intensifies search, involves Police appeared first on Frontpageng.

The students, who trooped out to the university’s main gate, chanted solidarity songs asking the authorities to issue them their ID cards or no examination.

The President, Great Ife Students’ Union, Issac Omoboriowo, told News Agency of Nigeria, NAN, in an interview that without ID card, there would be no examination in the institution.

Omoboriowo said that the students were taking legitimate action by demonstrating for their right.

According to him, for the past six years, students only got their ID cards once, even after paying for it together with the school fees every year.

“So, no ID card, no exam,” the students’ union leader said.

He also said that the demonstration provided them the avenue to take a firm stand and make it known to the world that they were paying for ID card annually, but not getting it.

Another student, Jimoh Oladipupo, said that it was regrettable that the university management had not provided identify card for their students for six consecutive years.

Oladipupo described the development as a fraudulent act by the management.

Another student, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said that his hostel, Awolowo Hall, had been overgrown with weeds, adding that the place was also infested by wild and dangerous animals.

“There’s also the scarcity of water in this whole big academic environment,” the student said.

He also complained about the overpopulated hostels and inadequacy of hostels, adding that the existing ones were old and dilapidated.

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“The situation has compelled many students to live off campus, even though not convenient for their parents.

“The management didn’t give us reasonable response for the ugly development, which is embarrassing to the university.

“There’s no way of identifying students and non-students because no one has an ID card,” he said.

The protesters urged the management of the institution to take urgent steps to produce the ID cards and build more lecture theatres.

They also appealed to the federal government to adequately fund education in the country.

Reacting to the students’ action, the university’s Public Relations, Mr Abiodun Olarewaju, said that the management was taking steps to address their complaints.

Source: NAN

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The Appeal Court made the declaration on Thursday, affirming the judgement by the Osun State High Court which sentenced Adedoyin to death.

It would be recalled that the Appeal Court had reserved judgment on October 29, 2024.

The judgment reads in part: “The judgment of the High Court of Osun State stands. Adedoyin’s appeal is dismissed in part. The Court of Appeal held that Adedoyin was properly convicted and sentenced to death.”

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“Order of forfeiture of Hilton Hotel quashed and set aside. Order of education scholarship to children of Timothy Adegoke by Adedoyin and others quashed and set aside,” the court ruled.

Adegoke was found dead in November 2021, at Hilton Honours Hotel, Ile-Ife, where he had lodged.

The hotel is owned by Adedoyin.

The post Adegoke’s murder: A’Court upholds Adedoyin’s death sentence appeared first on Frontpageng.

So soon after being inaugurated by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, duty beckoned for Professor Siyan Abdul Ghafar Oyeweso at the Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile Ife, Osun State.  The horizon blazed forth the shiny future in sync with the global proclamation gender activists that the future is female. Exemplifying instances played out thus: At the first convocation he presided over as the Chair of the University Council and Pro –Chancellor, a female pharmacy graduate, Susan Akinyuwa, emerged as the overall best. She earned 4.97 out of a total 5.0 GP.  It’s just the flickers of the future that Professor Siyan Gafar Oyeweso and the rest council members as well as the management and the staff of Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife are envisioning.

From the supply side, more like a long term investment, long forgotten, suddenly sprouting dividends, Nigeria’s First Lady, Oluremi Tinubu, graciously scooped out a whopping N1billion on Obafemi Awolowo University, OAU, for the comprehensive renewal of the landscape of the university that used to be reputable as the most beautiful in Africa. It was her own alma mater too, now endowed with a reliable leadership.

It is a leadership characterised by scholarly distinction and one with a trajectory dating back to years of Lagos bond with Nigeria’s first family.  Till date, Oyeweso, remains the personality historian to be beaten on such Lagos achievers including the legendary businessman and nature conservationist, Chief SL Edu and of course the author of what has come to be known as New Lagos, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu.  Believing so much in Tinubu, Oyeweso’s two distinct analytical volumes of landmark speeches of former Governor Tinubu remains the inimitable sources of primary data on the political vision of the President now playing out.  Yet, there was no iota of the likelihood of any shot at the presidency then. But the historian in Oyeweso has manifested the kind of precision that can only be matched by data scientist often aided by programmed machines.

The new team lead at OAU, Oyeweso, has been so unequivocal, even at the risk of being expressly repetitive, declaring his strong intent to bring back the enviable glory of the world class institution dating back to those years the university nurtured him and others to be the best in their respective realms of practice.

A first class history graduate of the then University of Ife, Oyeweso believes so strongly that OAU, his alma mater, cannot, under whatever consideration, be made to co-habit in the same bracket with low performing or struggling institutions. Oyeweso’s speech at the inaugural meeting of the council he is leading is as declaratory as it is retrospective:

“We pledge our unflinching commitment to the educational agenda of BAT’s Administration. We promise to deliver and we will not fail him… We are here today as co-inheritors of a wonderful heritage that has contributed significantly to our lives and career. I am happy to be here today as friend, partner, and son. I was sired, nurtured and bred here. But today, I am here with you to give back to this Great University all that we can give to ensure a more enduring and vibrant institution. We shall do this together in peace and harmony by the grace of God Almighty.  When I entered this university in 1978, I came in with so much joy in my heart and an unusual glint in my eyes, for being counted worthy to come and study in Africa’s most beautiful university campus. But that was not the only reason. By then, Ife products had become famous and vibrant. They showed great elan in whatever they were doing. We wanted to be counted amongst the lot.”

The lull suffered by the entire education sector in Nigeria over time notwithstanding, OAU, according to Oyeweso has remained a most outstanding training hub for ICT in Nigeria even as he acknowledges the innovative drive of the Faculty of Social Science.

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In a most convincing demonstration of his familiarity with the situation on the campus of OAU, Oyeweso notes the degeneracy of the hygiene and sanitation in particular. According to him, unlike the good old days characterised by ample water production and supplies all around the campus from a major source, boreholes are now sunk arbitrarily everywhere rendering the campus to possibility of tremor and allied disasters that may derive from such reckless abuse of nature. Many of the roads too are pothole ridden fall easily to torrents of rainfall making them impassable.

Already, this Council is acting talk and do as Prof Oyeweso noted at the 48th convocation ceremony held December 2024 thus: the Council and Management have ensured that staff are being promoted as at when due. We do not have backlog of promotion cases. In the same vein, Council has also prioritized student welfare.

For him, universities like OAU, have daunting problems not only because owner governments fail in their duties but because policy implementors too engage either inadequately or wrongly with issues.

Obviously guided by his robust experiential assets as a scholar of distinction and administrator with varied exposure, he undertakes a thorough and didactic analysis of the university with a sense great deftness and concludes with relevant solutionist suggestions. Understandably anchored on his background as a historian, Oyeweso alerts the council to the existential need for proper grounding of the citadel of knowledge on truthful and well researched knowledge of its establishment and operations till date: “The University needs an official history of its existence and achievements from inception to date. We must build on the existing publications of Great Ife at 25 (1987) and Great Ife at 60 (2021). We need to agree on the date to adopt for our university between the date of legal establishment (June 1961) and date of formal opening (October 1962). Celebrating Great Ife @ 10 in 1972, Great Ife @ 25 in 1987, Great Ife @ 50 in 2012 and Great Ife @ 60 in 2021 are not only bemusing but also confusing and misleading to say the least. The Department of History of the University must be mainstreamed in any future history book project for the University just as the Department of Dramatic Arts takes the central stage in Convocation Plays and the Department of Music is charged with musical interludes at official university programmes.”

Giving life to his formulations, the Oyeweso council has since constituted a 19-member high-powered Strategic Planning Committee for 2025-2050 development plan.  Chaired by Council Member Barrister Joseph Abaagu, it has as members Deputy Vice-Chancellor Mujidat Babalola as well as two former vice-chancellors, Prof Olufemi Mimiko and Sola Akinrinade.  The committee has been mandated to envision the future for the university by reckoning properly with the:

*      Will and strong determination to get things done

*      Willingness and readiness to access all available government resources like TETFund and Special Grants. This also requires proper utilisation of released funds and prompt retirement

*      Inviting well-meaning Nigerians starting with the Alumni located in different realms of life to renovate facilities as some old students have been doing, donate money, equipment and facilities, endow chairs and prizes and generally give towards programmes and events in the university

*      Inviting Businessmen to invest in laudable and lucrative with the assurance of safety of their investment as well as profitability

*      Properly securing the university estate against encroachment and proper utilisation of the landmass for profitable ventures. Highly commendable in this regard is the ongoing project of fencing the university estate. It should be sustained and seen to a logical conclusion.

Already, this Council is acting talk and do as Prof Oyeweso noted at the 48th convocation ceremony held December 2024 thus: the Council and Management have ensured that staff are being promoted as at when due. We do not have backlog of promotion cases. In the same vein, Council has also prioritized student welfare. A number of student hostels have been refurbished while others are under renovation. The Management has also ensured steady power supply to all halls of residence, the Hezekiah Oluwasanmi Library and other Faculty Libraries.

The Council has also put in place the necessary machinery for the rejuvenation of OAU Investment Company, OAU Guest Houses and OAU Commercial Farm. Our goal is to ensure that the University, in partnership with credible organizations embark on mechanized farming.”  For OAU therefore, the shape of the future is almost obvious as the morning sets the tone of the day.

*Akanni is an Associate Professor of Journalism at the Lagos State University. Follow him on X @AkintundeAkanni.

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The announcement was made on Monday in a statement issued by the Special Adviser to the President on Information and Strategy, Mr. Bayo Onanuga.

If cleared by the Senate, Ibiyemi will replace another lawyer, ‘Niyi Ijalaye, who died in August while serving as the resident electoral commissioner in Ogun State.

Ibiyemi, 58, who hails from Ilaje in Ondo State, is currently the Administrative Secretary of INEC in Lagos State.

She graduated from Obafemi Awolowo University in 1987 and was called to the bar in 1988.

She also went to Bingham University in Nasarawa State and bagged a Masters in Election Management.

READ ALSO: Democracy in the spotlight as Americans go to the polls

President Tinubu has also nominated Abdulrazak Yusuf Tukur as a National Commissioner for the Independent National Electoral Commission, representing the North West.

Tukur, 59, has a Bachelor of Arts from Bayero University, a postgraduate diploma in Economics from Bradford University, England and a Master of Arts from Leeds University, also in England.

He began working for INEC in 1999 as assistant chief administrative officer and rose to become the director of Electoral Operations and Logistics.

He served in the latter post till December 2023.

Tukur will also face the Senate for clearance.

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Professor Godini Gabriel Darah (GG Darah or simply “Comrade”, as we fondly called him) was one of our fire-spitting Marxist lecturers and staff advisers at the then University of Ife (now Obafemi Awolowo University), Ile-Ife aka “Great Ife”. Respect, sir! But how “great” is “Great Ife” today when it does not even rank among the top 10 universities in the country? It seemeth the university authorities have been sleeping and snoring, living in past glory! OAU has repeatedly failed, year-in, year-out, to measure up among the country’s first-tier universities. What’s the matter is, however, a topic for another day!

Comrade Darah’s “Tinubu’s regionalism gamble” is my concern here today. In it, the professor of Oral Literature and Folklore who hails from Delta State displayed the crab mentality that is as intriguing as it is unfortunate. If you put a hundred snails in a container, you will need a strong lid over the container with another heavy metal or stone on top to still find the snails in place the next day. But put a hundred crabs in the same container and leave the top open (with no cover whatsoever), you will find all the crabs intact the next day without any fuss! As one tries to make an escape, the others pull it back! Crabs are a typical demonstration of the “Pull Him Down” syndrome!  

Maybe I should first let you read Professor Darah; when we return, we shall make a few comments. Darah wrote: “Pandef, Pandef, beware of false prophets masquerading in electronic garments. There is sour mutilation of historical facts in the narrative on ‘How Tinubu Is Reversing The Damage Ironsi Did To Nigeria’ attributed to Reno Omokri.

“During British colonial rule, Regions were created in 1939 and their elected governments were in office from 1951. The Regions were three in number: Eastern, Northern, and Western. There was gross inequality and injustice in the regional system. For example, the territory of the Northern Region was larger than the combined territory of the Eastern and Western Regions.

“This lopsidedness triggered agitations for more political restructuring. Furthermore, hundreds of minority groups were lumped with more populous and hegemonic ethnic groups. The situation in the Northern Region was more bizarre as about 300 ethnic groups were put under the political yoke of the Fulani-controlled Islamic Sokoto Caliphate.

“From the 1940s agitations for more regions or states rattled the colonial regime. The agitation of the oppressed minority groups for autonomy dovetailed into armed uprisings in the Benue-Plateau areas, leading to federal armed campaigns to quell them. At the 1957-58 constitutional conferences in Lagos and London, the demand for the creation of states caused stalemates.

“The British responded by setting up Henry Willink’s commission on the fears of minorities and how to allay them. The commission toured all of Nigeria and received bundles of memoranda from freedom-seeking minorities. The commission’s report did not support creation of new administrative units with the excuse that doing so could derail the march to Nigeria’s independence scheduled for 1960.

“But the agitations continued unabated after independence, culminating in the creation, by plebiscite, of the Midwest in 1963. The emergence of the fourth Region fired more insurgent demands. The military governments from 1966 inherited this unresolved problem. Gen Aguiyi Ironsi’s quibbling approach fuelled more intense agitation. Gen Yakubu Gowon, from the ‘ulltra-minority’ Ngas ethnicity in Plateau province, could not ignore the matter. Thus, on May 27, 1967, he created 12 states, six each in the northern and southern halves of the country…

“Therefore, from 1967, the idiom of federalism shifted from regions to states. There are now 36 states. The 2014 National Confab recommended 18 more in furtherance of a more balanced federal system for the 389 ethnic nationalities in Nigeria. Perhaps, with the exception of the Igbo and Yoruba separatist extremists, the option of returning to regionalism is not on the agenda of the other 387 ethnic nationalities.

“Therefore, President Tinubu is swimming against a raging historical flood with his “panel-beater” method of “smuggling” the issue of regional governance into the national political discourse. His efforts are likely to end up in fiasco because the existing States will not meekly accept the option of “impeachment” and unconstitutional replacement which President Tinubu’s regional gamble portents”. That’s GG Sarah’s clarion call or battle cry addressed to PANDEF (Pan Niger Delta Forum), which is like the AFENIFERE, OHANEZE, NORTHERN ELDERS FORUM, etc.

It is true there is no standard objectivity since “objectivity” is moderated by the individual’s subjectivity. This was writ large in Professor Darah’s “Tinubu’s regionalism gamble”. The summary is that he does not want a return to regionalism. He is okay with the present 36-State structure that gives the advantage to the North – 19 in the North and 17 in the South. If more States are created “in furtherance of a more balanced federal system for the 389 ethnic nationalities in Nigeria”, Prof. may not object, the clamour that we scale down the cost of governance notwithstanding!

Funke Egbemode once aptly referred to the States as “begging bowls” that throng Abuja monthly for allocations from the Federation Account. Many of the States as presently constituted are not financially viable. The weight of the cost of governance is killing. Part of the argument – “insurgent demands” to Darah! – for regionalism is not fuelled by those Prof. called “separatist extremists” but by people who feel the country as a whole – all the four Regions – made better progress under the regional system of government in the First Republic and that a return to regionalism would reduce the cost of governance, cut wastages and accelerate the pace of development all over the country.    

There is, therefore, no “sour mutilation of historical facts” in the statement that the four Regions made landmark progress under the regional arrangement of the First Republic. That arrangement was also more “federal” than the present military-imposed 36-State structure that makes a mockery of federalism.  Whereas Prof. used regions and states interchangeably, there were no states in Nigeria before the military take-over of 1966; all we knew were regions. And regions and states are not the same thing in the Nigerian context at least.

Now, Prof. was right when he said, “During British colonial rule, Regions were created in 1939 and their elected governments were in office from 1951. The Regions were three in number: Eastern, Northern, and Western. There was gross inequality and injustice in the regional system. For example, the territory of the Northern Region was larger than the combined territory of the Eastern and Western Regions. This lopsidedness triggered agitations for more political restructuring. Furthermore, hundreds of minority groups were lumped with more populous and hegemonic ethnic groups. The situation in the Northern Region was more bizarre as about 300 ethnic groups were put under the political yoke of the Fulani-controlled Islamic Sokoto Caliphate. From the 1940s agitations for more regions or states rattled the colonial regime. The agitation of the oppressed minority groups for autonomy dovetailed into armed uprisings in the Benue-Plateau areas, leading to federal armed campaigns to quell them”.

The “gross inequality and injustice” Darah spoke about were not in regionalism as a system but in the way it was skewed to favour some at the detriment of others. And when the “agitations” this engendered were to be addressed by the coalition government of Nnamdi Azikiwe and Tafawa Balewa in 1963, a new region was neither created out of the Northern Region where there had been armed uprisings nor from the Eastern Region where the Ijaws were becoming restive (witness Isaac Adaka Boro’s short-lived revolution that followed); but it was from the relatively more peaceful Western Region that the Mid-west, where Darah hails from, was excised simply to weaken the West and prepare it for take-over by opposition forces, which eventually led to political upheavals in that region and the collapse of the First Republic.

Prof. simply said the Midwest Region was created “by plebiscite” in 1963; why was there no such plebiscite in the two other regions – the North and East – “in furtherance of a more balanced federal system for the 389 ethnic nationalities in Nigeria”? Darah conveniently side-stepped the fact that the creation of the Mid-west Region was, more than anything else, a North/East conspiracy to weaken the Southwest and marginalize the Yoruba in the politics of the First Republic. 

The creation of 12 states on May 27, 1967  by the then military Head of State, Yakubu Gowon, was portrayed by Prof. as a further attempt to address the agitations for a more balanced federal system; also conveniently ignoring the fact that it was a deft military strategy to cut the ground from under the feet of “rebel leader” Emeka Odumegwu Ojukwu and his secessionist agenda, which declaration came three days later on May 30, 1967.

So enamoured is Prof. with state creation that he gloated that “therefore, from 1967, the idiom of federalism shifted from regions to states…” It is not the “idioms of federalism” that shifted, it is federalism itself that gave way to military control and command structure where orders are rammed down the throat of everyone from an omnibus, omnipotent, omniscient and omnipresent Centre. What we operate at the moment is not federalism. Examples of federal states are there all over the world for us to compare and contrast with the caricature and contraption that we have here.

Darah said only the Igbo and Yoruba “separatist extremists” still savour the option of returning the country to regionalism while the other 387 nationalities are content with their “begging bowl” status as States. He needs to tell us where and when he conducted his survey or opinion poll! No matter how much we may camouflage or pretend, the words that we wield have a way of creating an expressway into our inner recesses. So the Igbo and Yoruba agitators are not “nationalists” or “freedom fighters”! They are not even ordinary “separatists” but “separatist extremists”! Call them “separatist terrorists” if that suits you better!

I am sure Darah himself qualified as an “extremist” in his days at Ife, if I remember correctly! Times and tides have changed, though! Comrade’s language today is that of the Establishment. However, there is nothing wrong in being an extremist or separatist. History is replete with extremists who have changed the course of history. Darah taught his students some of those extremists at Ife. Chairman Mao, Fidel Castro, Che Guevara, Karl Marx, Engels, Lenin, Cabral and a host of others. For decades, Nelson Mandela and his comrades were branded as extremists and terrorists. So also were Samora Machel, Robert Mugabe and a host of others. To be decorated with the badge of extremism like these our illustrious forebears is, therefore, an honour and not a reproach.

The crab mentality demonstrated by Darah is prevalent among the country’s ethnic minorities. Nigeria appears as their only sure bet. Can they stand or weather it alone? Do they have all it takes? What replaces for them the nebulous prestige of coming from the “Giant of Africa”? So, any ethnic group that exudes the confidence to run solo must be shot down. Whereas that is understandable, it is not a solution. Self-determination is a right recognised by the UN charter. Some have gone ahead. Others will surely follow. No crab will hold the Igbo and Yoruba down forever!

*Bolawole (turnpot@gmail.com 0807 552 5533), former Editor of PUNCH newspapers, Chairman of its Editorial Board and Deputy Editor-in-chief, was also the Managing Director/ Editor-in-chief of the Westerner newsmagazine. He writes the “ON THE LORD’S DAY” column in the Sunday Tribune and “TREASURES” column in the New Telegraph newspapers. He is also a public affairs analyst on radio and television.

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