THE STATE OF THE UNION: AN INSIDER'S PERSPECTIVE BY HON. JIGAN

THE STATE OF THE UNION: AN INSIDER'S PERSPECTIVE BY HON. JIGAN

"As long as the world shall last, there shall be wrongs, and if no man rebelled, those wrongs would last forever"- Clarence Darrow

I got back to campus this session after about a week of official resumption. On arrival, i was greeted with tasty stories of politicking and counter politicking being played by the President and Speaker of the house respectively. Word on the street was the Speaker, like the proverbial Ladoke Akintola, had turned the political tables in his favour by flipping the script he was handed by the President. He had out played the President by making sure that those in whom the President was pleased never assumed office. Most notably the Budgetary and Finance Committee of the Union and the Judicial Council of the Union.

Shortly after my arrival on campus, another Parliamentary sitting was called. Notable among issues discussed at this sitting was the issue of the newly constituted committees which some honourables felt were constituted without modalities. This thorny issue was given a befitting burial after the epoch making 38-34 votes were cast, 38 honourables vigorously asserting that the aforementioned committees were properly constituted. It is apposite at this junction to state that even though I abstained from the above election, I was satisfied within, afterall the overriding message in any democracy was that the majority, though the heavens may fall, will always have their way.

A few days after this notable event,  it started becoming evidently clear to me that a raging war was looming. A war between the President  on the one hand, and the Speaker (and maybe the VP) on the other hand was seeming likely to break out. It should be noted that the fuel in the furnace of these imminent war was being supplied by persons who in the course of these battle, had either an interest to protect or an interest to lose, after all, it was ardent political scientist Niccolo Machiavelli who told us that men  forget more easily the loss of their father than the loss of their patrimony.

Indeed, like every man with a modicum of worth, the Dr.Ibk Camp began reaching out to me. It is said that if you cannot gain the ears of a man, you gain the ears of those who has his ears. On this premise, certain persons who in my short stint as a  Union officer had become brothers to me started reaching out to me on the President's behalf. I obliged to meeting with the President, and after a few days in close proximity with him and his camp, my thoughts became clearer. What was going on a between the President and the Speaker was simply a tussle for who had the most power. The president, feeling slighted that the young man he midwifed to speakership had so easily forgot his humble roots, had decided he wouldn't take it. He wouldn't lose this political upheaval. He wouldn't allow the  Speaker so 'mesmerize' him. He had to find an answer. A recourse. What recourse? The Congress. Yes, the Congress!

It is needless at this point to state that the Congress is the reason behind the strange happenings in our union of late. While some have called it Doctor's doctored Congress, others say it was a midwifed  congress.  But, whatever adjective you ascribe to the June 8 Congress, the truth remains that it is the Congressional resolutions of that Congress that has led us to this junction.  More importantly, it is the discrepancies in the reports given by the Secretary General and the ASG that has further complicated the scenario.  According to the Sec. Gen's account of the Congress, as a result of a petition on the constitution of Committees forwarded to the President, the President consequently declared those Committees dissolved and the Speaker indefinitely suspended based on the preponderance of submissions given. The ASG however contrarily asserts that only one submission was entertained as regards the aforementioned petition, and that pandemonium broke out when some honourables alleged to have written such petition defiantly  denied to have written such, thus leading to an inconclusive and a rancorous end to the Congress.

From inception, my take to all this has always been that if truly the Congress dissolved those committees and furthermore suspended the Speaker indefinitely then  the Congressional resolutions are final and absolute However, the problem arises in a situation where the Sec.Gen, who is to take minutes of the Congress has a version of what transpired therein and the ASG, who is assist the Secretary in his duties, has another version of what transpired in the same Congress.

So many persons have come  to challenge me asking If I saw what transpired at the Congress and that it is what I saw that matters, not what anybody penned.  My stance on this is and always remains the same. In an highly official gathering as the Congress, the only tenable report of what transpired at such event will be the Gen.Sec and/or  the ASG's report. What matters is not what you or I saw. After all, both the Gen.Sec and his assistant were wide awake all through the duration of the Congress, yet both of them still penned conflicting reports.

What then are we to do in solving this crises? Truth be told, the solution to the situation at hand is not found in crying needlessly that what you saw was altered. After all, someone else saw something different. The Solution to this is going by on a fact finding mission. What do i mean?  Section 8 (6) of the Great Ife Constitution empowers the  SRC to do all such other things to guarantee the effective achievement objectives are set out in the preamble to the  Constitution. If one of those preambles include the promotion of a honourable community, then indeed the SRC has the powers to investigate the way and manner in which the June 8 Congress was conducted, if indeed, the  house seeks to promote a  honourable Community among great Ife Students, My  own take is that the committees and the persons who have been subjects of Controversy in the June 8 Congress should step aside for the time  being, following which an independent committee of enquiry can then look into the June 8 Congress to determine which of the two accounts by the Sec Gen and the ASG is  true and which is false. It is only after these enquiries that we can then know who to indict and who to vindicate.

Furthermore, I want to allude to the fact that the present problems facing Union is as a result of various lacunas in the Constitution. Truth  be told, our constitution isn't prepared for these present realities. It is in light of these that I propose the following measures;

1.) That the Great ife Student's Union constitution and reviewed with immediate alacrity.

2.) That the Constitution drafters pay specific attention to  the following blurred lines:
•  What fraction of Students is needed to make a Congress valid.

•  what procedures must the moderator of of a congress fulfill in calling for submissions.

• Should an inconclusive Congress be rendered null and void?

• Any other procedure as the drafters may deem fit.

It is my belief that once the proper structures are put in place, a lot of all  the grey areas  regards as Union and Congressional dealings will be a thing  of history. It is time for a scientific Union!

God bless Great Ife Student union!

Jigan
Parliamentarian representing the Faculty of law,Obafemi Awolowo University
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