Date Published: 09/17/09
Press statement
SAVE OUR SOUL
WE CONDEMN THE ATTACKS AND PHSYICAL ASSAULT OF COMRADE HASSAN TAIWO SOWETO (NATIONAL COORDINATOR OF THE ERC) BY CULTISTS LED BY NANS OFFICIALS
The Education Rights Campaign (ERC) condemn the physical assault of Comrade Hassan Taiwo Soweto (National Coordinator of the ERC) by cultists sponsored by the duo of Ahmed Agbabiaka (PRO National Association of Nigerian Students) and Jinadu Sodiq aka Akeju (Lagos State NANS JCC mobilization officer). Comrade Soweto was attacked for his radical activities as the National Coordinator of the ERC in condemning the rightwing NANS leadership for betraying the struggles of Nigerian students and most importantly for spearheading ERC’s consistent campaign against government neo-liberal policies on education especially the organizations’ support for the demands of ASUU, SSANU, NASU and NAAT.
We call on members of the public and Nigerian students to resist the organized attempt of these opportunistic NANS leaders and their state-backers to violently crush radical student activists campaigning for adequate funding of education while they do nothing about it.
Comrade Soweto was attacked first on Friday 11 th September 2009 at the GRA Ikeja residence of Late Chief Gani Fawehinmi during the mass procession organized by Labour and Civil Society Coalition (LASCO) for the late Senior Advocate of the Masses (SAM) and secondly at the Ondo residence of the Late Chief Gani Fawehinmi on Tuesday 15th September 2009 where the ERC National Coordinator and other ERC members had converged to pay their last respect. In the first attack, comrade Soweto was rough-handled and his cap was removed by the cultists. In the second and most violent of the attacks which occurred around 5:30am in Ondo and led by the NANS PRO Ahmed Agbabiaka and Jinadu Sodiq aka Akeju, Comrade Soweto was severely beaten by about 10 cultists and his clothe was torn. His live was saved by sympathetic students and activists who felt very bad that such a violent act could be perpetrated during the burial of Chief Gani Fawehinmi.
We hold Ahmed Agbabiaka (NANS PRO) and Jinadu Sodiq aka Akeju (Lagos State NANS JCC Mobilization Officer) responsible for this attacks. Before now, Comrade Soweto had received a call from Jinadu Sodiq threatening to deal with Comrade Soweto and disrupt any other protest held by ERC in Lagos State. This was shortly after the successful protest rally held by the ERC on August 10 2009 to compel Federal government to sign agreement with the striking unions so students could resume.
Even before these physical attacks, the NANS leaders in Lagos State had always tried unsuccessfully to sponsor cultists to tear ERC mobilization posters announcing rallies and to frustrate mobilizations for protests. It seems they have now realised that only by physically attacking leaders and members of the ERC will they be able to crush our agitation for a virile student movement that can resist government neo-liberal attacks on education. But very soon, they will realize this is a futile adventure because the Education Rights Campaign (ERC) is an ideological, mass-based and militant movement that has behind it millions of change-seeking and progressive Nigerian students who want to resist government anti-poor education policies.
We wish to thank all sympathetic activists and students who rescued Comrade Soweto from the cultists. Without their intervention, these murderous elements would have achieved their agenda to physically annihilate him. We thank all union leaders and activists who have condemned the assault.
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We assure all Nigerian students who have grown tired of the fraudulent activities of some of these opportunistic NANS officials and have being supporting the campaign of the ERC for a virile students movement capable of defending students against government policies of fee, victimization and education commercialization that we shall continue the struggle. The ERC remain undeterred despite these attacks. We believe Nigerian students are not fools, they know that the current set of NANS leaders are busy compromising their interests in exchange for money from government and politicians. They also know that this kind of leadership of NANS cannot defend their interest. This is why the ERC has become a growing force accepted among the mass of Nigerian students. The NANS leaders can only do away with us if they accept to defend students’ interests and fight government anti-poor and neo-liberal policies on education. If they should do this, the ERC will give them maximum support.
But if they continue in their path of betrayal, opportunism and compromise, we shall not relent in exposing them before Nigerian students. We shall continue our campaign for the revitalization of the National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS) as a mass-based and fighting association and not a den of cultists, traitors and lapdogs of anti-poor politicians it has become now. And if the opportunistic leaders currently entrenched in NANS should continue to violently repress these efforts, then they by their very hands will be ploughing the ground for the rise of a new, mass-based and militant National student platform.
The attack notwithstanding, we again restate our opposition to Government under funding of education and condemn the federal government for being rigid and insensitive over the on-going strike action of ASUU, SSANU, NASU and NAAT. We again reiterate our support for the demands of all the striking unions and we put the blame for the on-going strike which has kept Nigerian students at home for close to three months on the shoulders of the Federal government. We believe the handling of the on-going strike is an evidence that the Yar’ Adua government has failed. We therefore call for the immediate removal of the Education Minister Sam Egwu. For us in the ERC, we have resolved to mobilize other Nigerian students for a protest march to the National Assembly on Monday September 28, 2009 to protest Federal government refusal to sign agreement with the striking unions. Federal government has a choice to sign the agreement before September 28, 2009 to avert a “mother of all protest’ by Nigerian students.
