#ASUU Strike: Will President Jonathan Force The Universities Open?

Nov. 1, 2013

NewsRescue– Again on the ASUU Strike. (ASUU: Academic Staff Union of Universities)

There are hints, yes, insinuations, that the President, if ASUU rejects his next (perhaps, last) offer, will forcefully open the Universities- and perhaps Polytechnics, since ASUP is also on strike.

I’m forced to ask (myself), Can that happen? Will he drag the lecturers back to class or will he teach us himself?- I particularly look forward to a lecture on Schistosomiasis since he had a shoeless childhood.

But I answer my own question from my recollection of national events a mere score and two months ago when he let soldiers loose on our streets and shut down our (peaceful) protests against the petroleum product subsidy cut. Can he do that again? Can’t he?

Only the weeks ahead will tell. But if history is anything to go by, we have a President who resorts to force once he feels he’s at the wall. We’ve wondered if his is a pseudo-military regime. We just might get the answer soon enough- disappointingly.

As I pray it wrong the opinion that “the only lesson men learn from history is that men learn nothing from history”, I also pray that our President doesn’t have the Biblical Jonathan’s temper- or feel at wall, hands on throat and choking away. For we know how that ends.

Or do we now? With our colonial masters wondering just what to do with us, corrupt and rather corruption-ridden- and our rather enticing resources. With the former President tactfully silent- and silently tact. With the Military yet waiting on the lord- and renewing their strength.

God help us.

Amen.

Ayokunle Adeleye
Sagamu, Ogun State, Nigeria.