FUNAAB VC, Prof. Oluwafemi Balogun (Left) congratulating the SUG President, Com. Abdulkareem Bamigbade after the swearing-in ceremony. Inset; FUNAAB VC, Prof. Oluwafemi Balogun administering the oath of office on the Speaker-Elect and other Officers-Elect of the Union.
The Vice-Chancellor, Professor Oluwafemi Olaiya Balogun has inaugurated the 2011/2012 Executive of the University’s Students Union amid promises of goodies to the students, while recalcitrant will be sanctioned.
Addressing thousands of students, who filled the sprawling, Julius Amioba Okojie Lecture Theatre Complex to the brim, Professor Balogun, who was pleasantly cheered by the excited students, used the occasion to unveil the welfare packages put in place for them by the Management.
Most welcomed by the students was the decision of the Management “not to increase the fees payable by our students in the current 2011/2012 academic session”, stressing that the University had resolved to explore either internal means of cushioning the effects of limited scarce resources without belaboring parents and guardians, or do anything that could jeopardize the ambitions of our cherished students”.
Others are the provision of almost completed four blocks of Female Hostel, beside the University’s Fuel Dump, in addition to the proposed hostel to be provided in partnership with an American firm, for 10,000 students.
According to the Vice-Chancellor, other gestures coming include the provision of two additional brand new luxury buses and ambulances, to cater for the increase in students’ population.
Professor Balogun assured that “despite the realities of dwindling government resources, we shall ensure that facilities in the University compare favourably, if not better, than what obtains in other Universities”.
Like the proverbial two sides of the coin and aside from dangling the carrot, the Vice-Chancellor also wielded the big stick, cautioning that any student who disobeyed University’s rules and regulations, irrespective of status, would not be spared.
Performing the swearing-in, the Vice-Chancellor charged the Executive to be wary of their actions in office, as they affect other students and the University at large.
His warning, “Aluta should be done with the highest level of responsibilities. Don’t do anything that is capable of truncating our regularized academic calendar.
“Think about the future of over 13,000 fellow students that are now in your charge, don’t dash their hopes or give sorrows to their parents. Your predecessors worked tirelessly with other Unions, to regularize the academic calendar. Please, don’t truncate it”, he added.
Prof. Balogun, who frowned at the destructive attitudes of some students in the hostels, warned that anybody caught tampering with University’s properties will be ejected, immediately.
He also decried as shameful, the inability of some students to memorize and recite the University Anthem, stressing that such students were not fit to be members of the academic community.
Prof. Balogun, therefore, directed the Directorate of Public Relations, to publish the University Anthem in the institution’s official weekly publication, FUNAAB Bulletin, for the next two weeks, to assist the students in getting used to it and also tasked the Executive of the Students Union, to print and circulate copies of the Anthem among the students.
Prof. Balogun, however, warned that the Management will not hesitate to punish any erring student or staff, found crossing the lawn or indulged in the indiscriminate dumping of refuse on campus.
In his Acceptance Speech, the new President of FUNAABSU, Comrade Abdulkareem Bamigbade, promised to cooperate with the Management and other Unions in bettering the lots of students and the University, at large.