What The Acclaimed Students Forum Should Have Addressed — ESF

If every Students’ Forum release comes only when they are accused of instigating violence, label someone, a fellow student, as a cult member without proper evidence, and indict fellow students, rather than promoting peace and tranquillity amongst them, then there’s no need for a student forum.

Things fall apart where the centre cannot hold — This is the misfortune that has befallen The Polytechnic Ibadan. Will a house divided against itself still stand? Yet those at the hem of affairs have ab aeterno put a knife on the things that held us together and we have fallen apart.

The easiest way to make noise within a community is to divide its tribe. Over the years this division has trailed and has imprinted a negative stereotype in the minds of the student populace, one that I consider irrevocable.

Apart from the Main Campus segregation, another notable saga is that between the South Campus and North Campus of the Institution. This division finds its roots in prejudice beliefs (ism) like elitism, supremacism, classicism, and the result is a tale of sour taste.

How can a whole claim to be segmented? An institution divided into schools of thought; Southerners and Northerners, even warring camps thus creating tension within the students body. Two soldiers, expected to be brothers in arm, have now become a thorn in the flesh, a pain in the arse, and a source of great concern.[adinserter name=”Block 3″][adinserter name=”Block 2″]

Turning and turning in the widening gyre ad absurdum, we now find ourselves wallowing in the mire, with the consequences becoming increasingly unbearable. Time after time, we are visited with clashes, many of which always leave with hands stained in blood; both of those guilty and those innocent.

The North campus claiming supremacy, while those in the South keep fighting to defend their own. Motions of inclusivism raised now and then, sadly fallen to deaf ears and to futile grounds, trampled upon, and ignored like a vote of no confidence.

Dwindling in terms of infrastructural development, and famously taunted as thugs, it is glaring that the South campus is being left to decadence. The North in contrary is Bethlehem where the Lord Jesus was born; righteous to the teeth, at par with the values the Institution portray.

Hello Mr Schism Initiator, your experiment is hurting our peaceful coexistence on campus. You have only succeeded in planting hatred amongst brothers. Your selfish interests in a bid to further your goals by dividing us in exchange for cheap credits, has brought us to this point.

Greatest Nigerian Students, are we just going to sit in limbo with hands akimbo, and watch the taskmasters take us for a ride, incite violence and hatred amongst us, slitting our wrists with knives of discord. Truth is they are only concerned about the dough filling their bank accounts, and by making us unsynchronized they achieve their aims in sleek fashion.

We must not, as tribes in the community (South & North) encourage schisms and cheer on the battles, else we risk the chance of progressive forward movement. The ‘ism notwithstanding, it is important that we see ourselves as a machine with several parts all of which must work in synchrony for productivity.

Southerners are not thugs, neither are Northerners saints. We both have our strengths as well as shortcomings, and these we must use to complement each other, uniting forces to fight enemies from outside, whose mission is to paint the institution in a bad light that she might lose her place amongst the best in the country.

Intentionally pitting people against one another to get cheap credits is a dangerous self-indulgence. This has been the tale of several decades, but as we can see, it’s taking us nowhere other than backwards. All over the globe, there is no “Saint Town”, hence those harshly talking about Southerners should first check themselves and ascertain their level of purity before throwing the proverbial stone.

We are sick and tired of this ism schism, tearing us apart as game between the jaws of a hungry lion, causing divide among us like children of broken homes, and setting up warring camps in us as buffalo soldiers preparing for the second coming of Hitler.

Here in South, we yearn for inclusiveness. We want our piece of the pie, give us a sense of belonging that we deserve being part of the community. Rather than shredding our peace in pieces, we demand equal rights and justice.

This is what the students forum should have addressed rather than labelling one as cultist, and the other as saint or redeemer of peace.

Engineering Students Forum
Unity of Purpose

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