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By Oluseye Ojo
The Federation of Oyo State Students’ Union (FOSSU) has raised the alarm over worsening insecurity in Nigeria, declaring that education cannot flourish in an environment dominated by fear, violence and uncertainty.
The newly inaugurated President of the union, Ahmed Ademola Mufutau, raised the alarm over insecurity in Nigeria in his acceptance speech after his election, held at the International Conference Centre (ICC), University of Ibadan.
He called for urgent and decisive action from government and security agencies to protect students, teachers and educational institutions from growing security threats.
His intervention came amid heightened public concerns, following the abduction of pupils and teachers from schools in Oriire Local Government Area of Oyo State, an incident that has sparked widespread outrage and prompted industrial action by the Nigerian Union of Teachers (NUT).
Addressing students, government officials and other stakeholders, the FOSSU president described the increasing attacks on schools as a direct assault on the nation’s future and a dangerous trend that threatens the foundation of education in the country.
“Can we imagine, for a moment, the deafening silence in a classroom where laughter, debate and the energy of aspiring young people once echoed? Our students, armed with nothing but notebooks and dreams, alongside teachers whose only crime was shaping the future, were violently snatched from the safety of their schools,” he said.
Questioning the state of insecurity across the country, Mufutau wondered how the pursuit of education had become a life-threatening venture for many students and educators.
“When did the simple pursuit of knowledge become a gamble with one’s life? How did we arrive at a tragic junction where the chalk in a teacher’s hand is met with a gun?” he asked.
Describing attacks on schools as a grotesque distortion of the fundamental right to education, the student leader insisted that government and citizens must refuse to normalise such incidents.
