Skip to main content

SR Speaks: Does Ambrose Alli University Know How To Spell Justice?

Saharareporters is disgusted to learn that Ambrose Alli University, once it was through with its “investigation”, decided not just to punish the man responsible for the scandal, but to bayonet the wounded. 

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('content1'); });

Saharareporters is disgusted to learn that Ambrose Alli University, once it was through with its “investigation”, decided not just to punish the man responsible for the scandal, but to bayonet the wounded. 

According to Sam Uniamikogbo, the university’s Vice-Chancellor, student Judith Okosun “violated” the rules.

Ms. Okosun certainly stopped a man who, in effect, wanted to rape her using the name and authority of the university. 

Sure, she deployed unusual rules, but while it is not our intention or responsibility to defend her, what was a desperate young girl to do:  weep on the streets?  Call the Nigeria Police?  Or invite Professor Uniamikogbo to perch on a nearby tree with a camera?

She knew, and Professor Uniamikogbo knows this too, that none of those would have helped a student in her predicament in the defence of her dignity.

And so, because the student elected to deploy vigilante justice which obviously went out of control, the university chose to take a pound of flesh out of Ms. Okosun’s heart.

Exactly what problems have Professor Uniamikogbo and his university solved?  Are they claiming the triumph of the rule of law?  Have they protected the victim?  Have they provided female students of the university who face rape tonight at the hands of professors—some of whom may be sitting around Uniamikogbo’s pompous table—with the tools to protect their dignity without sacrificing their academic dreams?

The answers are all a resounding NO! 

In a deeply sad and profound sense, Professor Uniamikogbo and his cabal have achieved exactly what Engineer Otubu and people like him are doing on Nigerian campuses: raping Nigerian women again and again. 

If justice was what the university sought, justice provides succor, not additional violence.  The truth is that what Ambrose Alli University has done is to punish Ms. Okosun for daring to expose its soft underbelly.

Saharareporters believes that, keeping in mind the principle that the cure ought not to be worse than the disease, the university should have acted with far more wisdom and restraint than it has done. 

In the circumstances, we call on Governor Oshiomhole, the visitor to the university, to intervene immediately.  Ms. Okosun should be recalled and a far more just review undertaken.  The best thing the university can do to cultivate its own dignity is to establish a system that protects female students from teachers whose first instinct is not teaching, and lecturers from female students whose first tool is not their intellect.   

The university must make certain it can correctly answer the following question: “Can I guarantee to families that when their daughters come here they will be permitted to study to the best of their ability and not blackmailed in any manner either by irresponsible lecturers or a broken administrative system?”
 

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('comments'); });

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('content2'); });