Akeredolu Condemns Fetish Protest Against New OAU VC

Posted by Nwa Diokpa Latest Headlines, News Across Nigeria, News From The State Wednesday, March 23rd, 2022

(AFRICAN EXAMINER) – Chairman of the South-West Governors’ Forum and Governor of Ondo State, Oluwarotimi Akeredolu, SAN, has frowned at the turn of events at Obafemi Awolowo University (OAU), Ile-Ife.
African Examiner writes that the appointment of Prof. Adebayo Bamire as the institution’s 12th substantive Vice-Chancellor has come with a lot of commotions.
The protest by indigenes of Ile-Ife and traditionalists against Bamire’s appointment, according to Akeredolu, an alumnus of the University, was disturbing.
He stated that it was a display of an attitude foreign to academia that must be completely condemned.
On Monday, March 23, 2022, many Ife residents came into the varsity’s campus with charms and other fetish objects to protest the appointment of a new OAU VC who was not an indigene of the town.
In a statement he personally signed, Akeredolu stated that the development was a sign of massive rot in academics and also a sign of pervasive decadence in the country.
The statement partly read, “the latest news on the invasion of the campus by some Ife indigenes and traditionalists, allegedly, to protest the failure by the authorities to appoint ‘an Ife indigene’, showcases the extent to which the system has sunk, almost irretrievably.
“This latest assault on the intellectual by elements who, ordinarily, should not have any business with that ambience is unsettling.
“The silence of the intellectuals in that University suggests complicity and connivance.”
African Examiner writes that Prof. Bamire Adebayo is a native of Oyan in Odo-Otin Local Government Area of Osun State, Nigeria.