OAU Students Lament Accommodation Policy, Transportation Crisis
By Sodiq Lawal
Barely two weeks into the resumption of the returning students (stallites) of the Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile Ife, it has been gathered that the recently imposed accommodation policy by the university management has birthed a lot of inconveniences for students, which includes transportation crisis amongst many others.
Our correspondent who bodies the S.U.B bus stop discovered the hardship being faced by students, which was a result of the accommodation policy which led to the mass migration of students from their campus residences to town residences.
This has led to an increase in the need for a transport system considering the number of students who now require commercial vehicles to transport themselves to various destinations outside campus. Something similar to the regular bus-hustling in Lagos is gradually surfacing on OAU campus, as students now struggle to board buses.
Some students have complained bitterly about the academic implications of the transportation crisis.
In a brief chat with a part 3 student of the faculty of Technology who pleaded to speak under anonymity, he narrated an experience of how he missed an early class attendance because of the transportation crisis.
He had gotten to the AP (a location in Ife town) bus stop around 6:00am for a 7:00am lecture but was unable to catch a bus till 6:30 because bus drivers don’t operate early enough. After, a long struggle for transport, he got to campus at 7:04 but was unable to enter the lecture room because the lecturer had shut the doors and taken attendance.
Another female student who spoke to us said she feels she is the most affected by the crisis because since she started staying in town, she has not been able to catch early transport and feels reluctant to join the bus-hussle as it poses a lot of negativity to her religious doctrines.
According to a release of the hall executive council (H.E.C), it was gathered that the university management had released three coaster buses and increased the number of commercial buses to alleviate the transportation crisis but the crisis has persisted.
The climax of the day was when a long-stretch construction trailer stopped at the bus stop and a large number of students (estimately 100) struggled to climb and get a spot as that seems the only alternative they had.
The scene could have made one think they were migrants running away from a war zone.
A lot of students have begun to blame the insensitivity of the university management and demanded the restoration of the students’ union as the only solution to the present predicament.
A student had said;”Why are they chasing us outside campus and yet denying a platform to organise against this ugly development, later they will come and say they are our mummies and daddies.
Conclusively, analytical observations have shown that the only effective measure to combat the transportation crisis is the construction of more hostels on campus. But, surprisingly the management now construct hostels with public funds in areas off-campus like Parakin in Ile-Ife town.
