The University of Abuja, UNIABUJA, shut down in November 2012, remain closed and is now home to Fulani herdsmen
As academic life returns and picks up in tertiary institutions across the country, students of the University of Abuja, UNIABUJA, are still unsure of when the institution would resume as the gates remain shut.
The main campus of the university
remains largely bereft of the normal hustle and bustle of academic life
with most offices locked and classroom and labs taken over by cobwebs.
The strange sight that greets a visitor
is that of Fulani herdsmen and their families living in makeshift tents
close to the administrative area, the International Centre for Investigative Reporting is reporting today.
UNIABUJA has been shut since November
last year following protests by students. Trouble started when students
staged a two-day protest beginning November 19 demanding accreditation
of some courses.
The students, mainly from the faculties
of Medicine, Agriculture and Engineering, had been in the institution
for years without hope for award of certificates by the school because
their courses had not been accredited.
Some of the protesters comprised
ex-students who had graduated but had neither been given results nor
enlisted for the mandatory National Youth Service Corps, NYSC, scheme.
The protest was sparked by an announcement by the Minister of Education, Ruqayyatu Rufa’i,
the previous week, suspended the programmes that had failed to meet
with the National Universities Commission, NUC’s accreditation criteria.
The Vice Chancellor of the university, James Adelabu,
addressed the students, appealing to them to tread the path of peace.
He said although the accreditation challenge was inherited by his
administration, the school’s management was doing its best to ensure the
issue was resolved.
But persistent protests by the students
led the authorities of the university to shut its gates and send
students home. Two months after, the gates remain shut and students are
not allowed into the campus.
In fact, security checks have been heightened around the entrances to the institution to ward off the students.
The refugees take over
When our reporter visited the school and
eventually gained entry this week, the sights that greeted her were not
those of young men and women gaily dressed for lectures but men and
women squatting in temporary tents.
These are the victims of clashes
between Fulani herdsmen and the indigenous Gwari population last
December over farmland and grazing of cattle which led to the death of
two persons, the burning of houses and displacement of about 1500.
The minister of the Federal Capital
Territory, FCT, BalaMohammed, thereafter gave the university premises as
a temporary habitation for the displaced persons and constituted a
committee to look into the causes of the communal clash, with a view to
proffering solutions.
One month has gone since the incidence
and the refugees are still camped at the school in tents situated in the
heart of the campus, right beside the senate building. Rather than
students clutching books, what you see are Fulani herdsmen lounging in
from of the tents and their women engaged in household chore – fetching
water and cooking.
A source at the Federal Capital
Territory Administration, FCTA, said the fact-finding and implementation
committees set up to investigate the issue had submitted its findings.
What remains is for the technical team to act on the findings and
provide an alternative permanent settlement for the refugees.
Our source however could not say if
funds had been released to the team even though the minister announced
a N30million compensation for the victims. He could also not say for how
long the refugees would continued to be camped on the campus.
Students stole goats, yams
Meanwhile, students and lecturers of the
institution alike do not know for certain when the school would be
reopened but there are speculations that it may not be until the end of
next month.
The authorities had promised the
students that their unaccredited programmes would be accredited before
the end of February; a condition which the protesting students have said
must be met before academic activities can commence.
A professor, who is also a member of the
investigative panel set up by the school, confirmed that the school’s
management was working hard to resolve the pending challenge.
He said the panel had concluded it
report and would submit same to the institution’s senate in a meeting
tentatively scheduled for next week, but gave no likely date for
resumption. The professor did not agree to be named saying he was not
authorised to speak on the matter.
The university’s public relations
officer, PRO, Garba Waziri, confirmed this, saying that the committee
instituted by the school to look into the causes of the crisis only just
concluded its findings and is yet to submit its report.
He said, however, that the school’s
Senate would be presented with the report next Wednesday and hopefully a
date for resumption would be decided then.
As for the refugees in the compound, Mr.
Waziri said that the deadline given by the FCT minister elapsed today
(Friday) and as at the time he got to the school that morning,
the Fulani had been relocated to another space further inside the
permanent site, although he said that the National Emergency Management
Agency, NEMA, was yet to remove its tent.
It was gathered from some of the
students that before this time, some Fulani lived within the school
premises, although in far-off settlements in undeveloped parts of the
university land.
They also alleged that it was
these Fulani that the school authority mobilised to attack the students
during the protest. The students therefore expressed the fear that their
lives and properties were not safe as long as these strangers continue
to dwell within the school premises.
But Waziri has refuted these claims as not true.
“It is not true that the school employed
the services of theFulani to stem the crisis. We have our internal
security, the mobile police and our own private security men who are
always on ground. So it is not true,” he said.
He added that: “You see, these students
have something to hide which they don’t want the public to know. During
the protest, they went to our agriculture farms and took some goats
which they slaughtered and ate, they also went to the farms of
the Fulani and harvested their yams; as well as broke into our bursary
and carted away some money,” the school’s spokesman alleged.
However, he did not disclose exactly how
much money the students stole but confirmed that indeed some Fulani
were permanently residing within the school compound even before the
crisis.
Courses still not accredited
When our reporter visited the NUC office
in Abuja to ascertain the level of progress made by the university
towards the accreditation exercise, the deputy director of information,
Ibrahim UsmanYakasai, said: “this is an internal crisis that should be
managed by the school.”
He declined speaking about how far the
university had gone with the accreditation of outstanding courses,
saying the school has a management body, Senate and governing council
and well able to manage its crisis, and that “everywhere NUC needs to
assist, we have assisted.”
Mr. Yakasai said, however, that the real
issue is not that of accreditation but of resource verification, adding
that ‘if the school has said that it would resume very soon, why should
we doubt them? I’m sure that the school’s management is on top of the
situation.”
While the resumption remains uncertain,
some affected students are taking their destinies in their hands. They
were seen processing their transcripts to other schools for a
continuation of their programmes.
A 500-level student of Engineering at
the University who would not like to be named said he could no longer
wait for the institution to decide his fate and was making attempts to
move to another university.
“Even if this issue is resolved, the
stigma will still remain. It would take years of rebranding to remove.
Right now employers do not value the certificate of the school,” he
said.
Even if the issue of accreditation is
resolved, there are still other pending issues. Apart from
accreditation, some other demands the students have put forward include
demands for more hostel facilities, accurate computation of results,
extension of examination duration (exams are usually conducted in one
week) and the lifting of the ban placed on the school’s Student Union
Government, SUG, since 2005.
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