UNILAG Students Mobilise Support For Remanded Colleagues

Student groups under the umbrella of Alliance of Nigerian Students against Neoliberal Attacks (ANSA) and the students’ union of the Tai Solarin University of Education (TASUED), Ijagun, Ogun State, have visited the 13 students who were on Saturday remanded in Kirikiri by a Special Offences Mobile Court which sat at Oshodi, Lagos.

The students, who also visited their colleagues in prison yesterday evening, described the arrest and detention of the student leaders as victimisation of the oppressed by the neoliberal forces in the country. According to the Acting Coordinator of ANSA, Sanyaolu Juwon, the visit to the prison by the student leaders was not only a show of solidarity but also a sign of their relentlessness in their quest for better welfare condition on campuses and reinstatement of the suspended colleagues.

The students, who were arraigned by the police on a two-count charge of attempt to disrupt the second semester examination scheduled to commence on Monday at the University of Lagos (UNILAG) and unlawful invasion of the Television Continental compound, were ordered to be remanded by Chief Magistrate P. E. Nwaka.

He adjourned the matter for their bail application to April 6. Those remanded are Femi Adeyeye, Toni Aina, Kodri Yaya, Asimiyu Oladimeji, Ismahil Olalekan, Segun Okesola, Abdulazeez Soneye, Idris Abogunloko, Muyiwa Olaniyi, Toheed Oladimeji, Joseph Akanni, Lukumon Olusegun and Abiodun Agbeniyi. This came as the UNILAG management has denied the affected students, saying none of them was a student of the institution but that they were from TASUED, Ijagun, Ogun State.

The UNILAG Deputy Registrar (Information), Mr. Oluwatoyin Adebule, who confirmed the arrest of the students on the campus, said they were rounded up by the university security men while attempting to stage a protest and disrupt the examination scheduled to commence on Monday and were handed over to the Sabo Police Station. Adebule said they were from the Police Station transferred to the State Criminal Investigation and Intelligence Department (SCIID), Panti, Yaba.

He said: “It was the police at Panti that ordered their arraignment before the mobile court. “It is very clear that they are not our students, they are from TASUED because they even came in their students’ union bus.

The only one who could claim to be our student, that is, Femi Adeyeye, is still on suspension and cannot resume now. He just mobilised his friends from other campuses to disrupt activities here the same way he did during convocation.” The police prosecuting counsel, Effiong Asuquo, has reportedly said the offence allegedly committed by the students contravened the provisions of section 168 (1) (d), and Section 2 of the Criminal Law, Laws of Lagos State, 2015.