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From Sylvanus Viashima, Jalingo
Students of Taraba State University, Jalingo, took to the streets on Monday, January 9, 2023, sparking tension in the state capital. They blocked major roads and burnt countless tyres. The riot resulted in few cases of injured persons and forced a sizable population of residents to scamper for safety.
Trouble began after the students resumed school and discovered that the scheduled first semester examination was suspended indefinitely.
Their examination halls were under locks and keys. None of their lecturers were on ground to conduct the examinations earlier scheduled to hold that Monday.
Investigations by Daily Sun indicated that both the academic and non-academic staff resolved at a meeting held during at the weekend, to abandon the conduct of the examination. The resolution followed the failure of the state government to pay their 10-month outstanding salaries and other allowances.
The students were angry and disappointed at the development. They started gathering in small groups. By midday, they broke out into a protest. It was mild initially, but became disorderly and violent as the students matched on. They started burning tyres and obstructing traffic. They marched to the Government House with placards singing solidarity song songs.
They insisted the governor must see them and clear the outstanding salaries of the staff. They threatened that if he failed to do the needful to pave the way for them to sit for their examinations, there would be no elections in the state.
A 400-Level student of Community Health Sciences, who pleaded anonymity, lamented: “By 2021 ending, I was already a 400 level student. Early last year, the nationwide strike by the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) caught up with us. We ended up wasting most part of the year at home. We resumed eventually to prepare for the examinations, only for it to be suspended again.
“This is 2023. Three years in the same semester on the same level.
That is too bad. That means three years of paying our house rent without using it. One is not getting any younger.
“One would have expected the governor to tackle the issue with the university staff bearing in mind our plight as students. We are the victims of these reoccurring confrontations. It seems the governor doesn’t have the interest of the ordinary people at heart.”
Observers believed the protest was avoidable as the authorities saw it coming but took the situation for granted. The university staff last week staged a peaceful protest over the non-payment of their salaries.
They threatened to abandon the examinations, should the government failed to pay them. Many felt that would have been the time to act.
Solomon Ishaya Audu, NASU chairman and Bitrus Joseph Ajibauka, SSANU chairman, presented a letter to the Vice Chancellor Prof Sunday Bako.
They demanded: “Payment of the outstanding salary balance of March and June 2022; payment of the outstanding responsibility and hazard allowances for September 2021; payment of the 75 per cent outstanding third party deductions of October 2021; payment of the outstanding full salaries of July to December 2022; payment of the outstanding promotion arrears of the non-academic staff; payment of the Earned Administrative Allowances (EAA) for non-teaching staff on a ratio of 50:50 with the academic staff and the review of the usurpation of headship that are meant for the non-academic staff by the academic staff of (1) University Farm Manager, (ll) University Admission Officer (lll) Director CBT (iV) Directorf ICT (V) Director of Sport.”
Bako assured them that the university management and the government were working to meet their demands. His conciliatory tone was sharply different from that of Governor Darius Ishaku. He recently affirmed that he would not pay the lecturers for the months they participated in the nationwide ASUU strike. He insisted that state owned-university staff had no business joining an industrial action called by the national academic and non-academic unions.
Although calm has returned, Joseph Nathaniel Rishante, Students Union Government president, said their reaction was purely spontaneous. He insisted that the university unions did not instigate their protest.
ASUU’s chairman of the university, Dr Samuel Shiikaa, said: “It is very sad that this situation was allowed to degenerate to this point.
Of course, you can’t help but understand the anger and frustrations of the students. They should be calm and not conduct themselves in a manner that would create room for hoodlums to hijack their peaceful protest and complicate situation.
“In as much as I understand the plights of their parents, I think it is also very important that they begin to speak out against the illegalities going on in the system.
“This is a university, not a primary school. The university was established by an Act of Parliament. There are specific provisions on how it should be run. Going against these provisions at the detriment of our members and other workers in the university as well the general good of the institution is wrong and should be roundly condemned by all.
“How do you expect a hungry lecturer to go and administer examinations to the students? Where will he even get the transport money to come to school? “
Daniel Nbashi, said: “I have three kids in that university. Each year, you pay for house rent, buy food items and provision for them to resume university only for the school to come up with one flimsy excuse or the other to shut down the university.
“If the state government was not ready to run the university, then why set it up at all? It will be better if they had handed it over to a competent private sector interest to run it.”
Spokesperson, Taraba State Police Command, Abdulahi Usman, could not be reached for comment as he neither picked nor returned his calls.
