By Faith Adediran
The Students’ Union body of the University of Ibadan convened a congress on Saturday, 14th of October 2023 at the Kunle Adepeju Students’ Union Building Foyer in a bid to proffer solutions to issues affecting the students.
The Congress which is known as the general meeting of the union, was called by the office of the President of the Union, Samuel Samson Tobiloba (Host), to discuss and proffer solutions to urgent and important issues that are facing students since the resumption of the new session.
The congress, which was meant to start by 7am, kicked off at 9am due late arrivals of students and low turnout, lasted for 3 hours, with three major resolutions being made on the State of the Union and other business of the day.
The three resolutions of the Congress as it was read by the Union’s President at the end of the event includes: First, it was agreed by the entire students that there has been a wide margin in communication between the management of the university and the entire student populace.
Also, the student expressed their displeasure with the introduction of new fees at every level of academics either at the department, faculty, or the university level because they are unjustified. Clarifications and justification were requested before the students are allowed to pay such fees.
Lastly, the students also expressed their grievances on the kind of treatment and reactions by the practitioners at the Jaja clinic. One of the participants had this to say about their experience “Jaja Clinic filters emergency cases based on severity. A UIte having seizures was delayed in Jaja’s ambulance for an hour, thirty minutes, with the explanation given by Jaja officials being that they were waiting for another patient with a similar case, so they could transport them together”.
After the reading of the resolutions of the congress, the President proceeded to announce the adjournment of the congress till further notice. It must be noted that this is the first congress of its kind in the University of Ibadan, since May 27, 2017 under the Ojo Aderemi administration which had a significant impact on the chain of events in the institution during that period.
