FROM IKHILI EBALU, BENIN CITY
Senate of Ambrose Alli University, AAU, Ekpoma, has approved the extension of course registration on the portal for the 2023/2024 academic session by two weeks including the registration of courses for students who paid school fees and participated in the 2022/2023 session.
AljazirahNigeria had earlier reported that students as early as 6am on Thursday locked the main gate into the university preventing the Acting Vice Chancellor, Professor Sonnie Adagbonyin and other staff access into the university.
The protesters, who were dominated by students of the faculties of law and management science anchored their grudge on the obnoxious policies of the Adagbonyin-led administration, which among others, compelled majority of them to be transfered to other departments via introduction of proceeding list which they said is unknown to the law, rules and regulations of the university.
The Senate called the emergency meeting following a peaceful protest at the university gate by some students requesting that they be allowed to register the courses which they failed to do in the 2022/2023 session and some law students over a ‘Proceeding’ list released by the Faculty of Law.
According to a memo signed by the Acting Registrar, Comrade Ambrose Odiase, after the meeting, “the
Senate considered its extant rule that provides that only students with a CGPA of 3.0 and above in the Faculty of Law should proceed to the next level. This rule is to ensure that the university maintains its leading role of providing excellent and quality legal education for its students and to comply with the admission quota prescribed by the Council of Legal Education.
“Based on the response of students to the implementation of this rule and the appeals therefrom, Senate approved that a CGPA of 2.5 be used to determine those to proceed to 300 level in the faculty for the 2022/2023 session only.
“Senate also considered the extension of normal course registration for the 2023/2024 session and graciously approved that normal course registration be extended for another two weeks, from Thursday, June 6 to Thursday, June 20. It hoped that students would seize the opportunity to complete their course registration within the new window.”
On the issue of non-registration of courses by some students who paid school fees and participated in examinations in the 2022/2023 session, the management approved that one week be given for them to carry out the course registration formalities, through the ICT backend.
Senate approved that “other students experiencing difficulties in course registration should write to the chairman of Senate through their respective departmental board of studies and Faculty Boards. These would be considered based on their individual merit. These requests must be made within the next two weeks from Thursday, June 6 to Thursday, June 20.”
Meanwhile, the management of the university has described as completely false, reports making the rounds that the students were protesting management’s “harsh policies.”
Its Head of Corporate Communication and Protocol, Otunba Mike Aladenika, in a telephone interview with AljazirahNigeria said: “the issues in the media are a far cry from the reality here and what the students were asking for.
“You can see from the resolutions of the Senate that the university means well for its students. The protest was led by students who failed, through their fault, to follow through with the existing extant rules of the university which they are conversant with, and those who had issues with the ‘Proceeding List’.
On the course registration issue, while thousands of their mates obeyed the deadlines, which were extended several times, these ones did not. Management met with their leaders several times prior to this protest, but they remained adamant and kept insisting that the university must turn the hand of the clock backwards and open the portal for them to register for a session that had already passed, with all its technical consequences.”
He singled out some reports that were coming even while the Senate was still meeting, inflaming passions, reporting non-existent “crisis” in the university and a video where an unidentified person was talking about the university being purportedly closed by Governor Godwin Obaseki to favour a university allegedly owned by a brother of the governorship aspirants of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, Barrister Asue Ighodalo.
Aladenika advised politicians to steer clear of the university and not use it as a cannon fodder for their shenanigans and campaigns. He enjoined members of the university community and the general public to disregard the said reports in its entirety.
