What Akwa Ibom Students May Not Know


By UbongAbasi Ise

“When kings lose direction, they become servants” – African Proverb

Institutions of higher learning are, of course, the pinnacle of ideas. They reflect the height of civilization and human refinement. Every tertiary institution is not just a community of people but a community of ideas where public officials could always look up to in wants of ideas and models that could help run the society in the most efficient manner. Somehow it is yet to be ascertained if the present generation of students have perished away the radical fibres and independent-mindedness needed to strengthen the ideological constructs of our society. It becomes extremely regrettable that student unions today are vulgarizing their privileged position by hanging about politicians who only see them as means to an end and treat them as those that lack ideas. The endorsement rally for Governor Udom Emmanuel’s reelection as purportedly arranged by Akwa Ibom Students on Thursday 10th January 2019 has added up to the growing conversation in the buildup to the general elections and this has largely revealed the unsavory detail about the government-student relationship since the incumbent state governor assumed power  in 2015. To commentators that described the student solidarity rally as a sordid and naked scam may have a good point because it simply doesn’t follow logic that students, with all their eruditions, could go en masse to wander the streets of Uyo under the scotching January sun in the name of expressing support for the continuation of the tenure of a Governor who has not paid bursary to any Akwa Ibom student throughout the life of his administration; a Governor, who probably considers it a waste of resources to pay law and medical students allowances, who would not want to award scholarship to students in the critical area of scientific learning. Perhaps, the rally was another machination of the governor’s aides who are always looking for a way to fleece their principal who is desperately looking for a support base as the gubernatorial battle draws nearer. After the poor students toiled all day to-and-fro IBB Avenue and Wellington Bassey Way, a distance of about 4 kilometers, some of them had to struggle to get N1,500 and N2,000 peanuts late in the night following colossal pandemonium in the state capital.  The N31 million announced by the Governor to have been donated to the students is still trailed by mixed messages that complicated the whole narrative even more.  Could it be that the brains of our students were used in a very cheap manner just for the spectacle of the media or say political camouflage in order to intimidate the opposition? Or were these students ridiculed because certain political contractors wanted to make money in the last minute of Udom Emmanuel’s administration? Whatever the response advanced to invert the discourse to any party’s favour, Akwa Ibom students do not deserve the devilish humiliation meted on them by the elements of Akwa Ibom State Government on Thursday 10th January, 2019, and this ungodly treatment should be condemned in all ramifications.


                Today, Mr. Udom Emmanuel is laboring to inveigle himself into the sympathy of the students just to win their hearts at the polls. So bad that students are viewed merely as the election materials meant to support the PDP governor’s renewal of tenure. If Udom Emmanuel is not using them as means to an end, why is he recognizing them now after three years of inexplicable snub? Why was he assuring them, about two months to the elections, that the state government is working modalities to pay them bursaries? Could someone sense unholy kindness in the character of the present state government? You can fool some of these students but you cannot fool all of them so to speak.

                But why are the Akwa Ibom students allowing themselves to be used like jackass? Where are the students’ radical socio-political ideas disappear to? The independence we are savouring today in the country was driven by inventive thoughts of students in the colonial era. Students at the time, whose political leanings were considered left-wing, set up Nigerian Youths Movement (NYM). The Lagos Youth Movement, rechristened the NYM in 1936, was created in protest of the inferior educational opportunities and it later formed the nucleus of Nigeria’s first genuine nationalist movement that contributed to the desire for independence which eventually was actualized in 1960.

In present times, our students ought  to follow progressivism in their political orientation and align themselves with political order that promise progressive governance  because such  has its ideology founded on human progress through education, science, technology, craftsmanship, economic development, and general improvement of social welfare.

                Looking at the manifesto of the Akwa Ibom APC gubernatorial candidate, Obong Nsima Ekere, there is a lot in it to excite Akwa Ibom students because of its progressive orientation and expressed belief in education as the basis for sustainable human development and rapid progress. Besides the promise for increase in support for students in tertiary institution by raising student bursary from paltry N5,000 to N25,000 per session, Ekere in his manifesto titled, The New Vision for the Collective Prospective, puts that his government will be “totally committed to a dramatic increase in funding education from the current 1.6 percent of the state budget to a progressive increment towards meeting the UNESCO target of 23 percent by 2023. A special intervention fund of N30 billion will be considered for the upgrade of libraries, laboratories, sports facilities, construction of new school blocks, and generally improve the learning environment.” In case our students were not aware of this, they have a chance to reconsider their stance as the general elections close in.

Yes! I am UbongAbasi Ise. For Comment, send SMS to 08189914609 | ubongabasiise@gmai.com

©The Sensor Newspaper

Go Home to read more

>NANS Berates Udom Over Sack of 5,000 Teachers, Unpaid Student Bursaries
>A’Ibom APC Raises Alarm Over Infiltration Of PDP Elements
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>What Akwa Ibom Students May Not Know

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