FEATURE ARTICLE

Temple Chima UbochiThursday, November 21, 2013
[email protected]
Bonn, Germany

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WHY SHOULD PROF. IYAYI, DR. MAHMUD TUKUR AND CHIMA UBANI DIE THE SAME WAY?


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Our prime purpose in life is to help others. And if you can't help them, at least don't hurt them (Dalai Lama)

Despite all the progress humankind has made in the past millennium, the problem of state sponsored murder has remained (Rummel)

rofessor Festus Iyayi, former president of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), died on November 12, 2013, in a car crash on his way to Kano for a meeting of the union. The crash involved the convoy of the governor of Kogi State, Captain Wada Idris, along Lokoja–Abuja Road. But, the Joint Action Front (JAF) has accused the Federal Government of killing the former president of the Academic Staff of Universities Union (ASUU). The group claimed that the murder of Comrade Iyayi was connected with the on-going ASUU strike to compel the Federal Government to, not only honour the collective agreements it reached with it in 2009; but equally to make government responsible to adequately fund public education, against the dictates of its puppeteers – the IMF and World Bank.

The Joint Action Front (JAF), in a press statement published by African Examiner, said “We strongly believe that the assassination of Comrade Iyayi was carried out by expert shooters in the cover of the Nigerian Intelligence, reminiscence of the State murder of Dele Giwa in 1986 and Kudirat Abiola in 1996. The ‘official explanation’ so far floated by the Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC) and the Sole Administrator of the Specialist Hospital Lokoja, Dr. Paul Amodu, that Comrade Iyayi’s death was as a result of the accident, does not explain away “The Strange Object That Pierced Iyayi’s Heart”. The assassination of Comrade Iyayi was actually a state act aimed at destabilizing ASUU in the wake of a major national struggle. Comrade Iyayi was actually found-fixed-finished because of his prominent role in exposing the Government’s IMF and World Bank destructive policies in Education and the Nigerian economy, thereby putting a lie to the false claims that Nigeria is broke, as cover to loot public wealth for private selfish interests. As we in JAF commiserate with Iyayi’s family, ASUU, comrades and friends of Comrade Iyayi and the oppressed poor in Nigeria and Africa whose Iyayi’s struggles touched; we urge the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), Trade Union Congress (TUC), Nigeria Medical Association (NMA), the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) and ASUU to join forces with JAF to unravel the FACT behind the State murder of Iyayi by challenging the Presidency, Minister of Defence and the Inspector General of Police to tell the public the strange object which pierced Iyayi’s heart and why Festus Iyayi should be murdered? Comrade Festus Iyayi’s death is a wakeup call to all Nigerians to struggle for system change. As far as we in JAF are concerned, Nigerians should no longer tolerate this unjust polity where: a very tiny group of Nigerians, who loot the treasury, use their stolen wealth to sustain themselves in power; use their power to get richer and richer while the poor get poorer and poorer, and use the unjust system to bring out the army and the police to kill the poor people and comrades whenever we protest against oppression and exploitation”.

JAF then reminded Nigerians that a former ASUU President, Comrade Dr. Mahmud Tukur, was murdered in a similar painted-accident scenario on the Kaduna-Zaria road in 1982, following ASUU’s dispute with the Shagari’s National Party of Nigeria (NPN) Government in 1980/81 on the same issue of funding, university autonomy and academic freedom, as it is today with the Jonathan Presidency.

Chima Ubani, who was a leading human rights activist and mobiliser, the Executive Director of Civil Liberties Organisation (CLO), and the brain behind Campaign for Democracy died in a car crash in Potiskum, Yobe State on September 21, 2005, during a nationwide sensitisation tour of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) to protest fuel price increase. Chima Ubani and others died when the official jeep of the then NLC president, Mr Adams Oshiomhole, they were travelling in somersaulted many times. They were on their way to Abuja to connect a flight to Lagos after an anti-fuel price hike rally in Maiduguri, Borno State. Then, the Civil Liberties Organisation (CLO) called for a probe into his death (Guardian July 11, 2007). The CLO alleged that there was more to the death of the renowned activist than meet the eyes. CLO alleged that its report of a preliminary investigation into the death indicated that the car crash was not natural. That the right front tyre of the jeep in which Chima Ubani was killed may have had an explosive device attached to it and which subsequently exploded, causing the vehicle to somersault several times. Alternatively, the group said, the tyre may have been shot at by local intelligence operatives with the aid of a high-tech weaponry and global positioning system (GPS).

This writer is not trying to infer anything here, but, it’s suspicious that the three Comrades (Prof. Iyayi, Dr. Mahmud Tukur and Chima Ubani) should die almost the same way – when they were on a nationwide mobilization against the wickedness and insensitiveness of the administration of their time. All these men have something in common; in that they were fighting for the oppressed people through the piling of sufficient pressure on the regime of their time to address the people’s demands, before they met their death. Was it coincidental that these three Comrades died the way they did, during the heat of their struggle against government’s impunity, recklessness, negligence and executive lawlessness? Or were they murdered by the state for being thorns in the flesh of the government of their time? Is there atom of truth in the allegations that they were murdered for being on the side of the oppressed? Only God knows!

This column commiserates with the Iyayi family. And may the untiring souls of Prof. Iyayi, Dr. Tukur and Chima Ubani continue to rest in perfect peace! This writer is sure that those souls, which laboured so much and so hard for the poor masses, have finally found rest in eternity.

TIT BITS

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r9Zfw16Ctb0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VLaCAfBbqng

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tr97MQiqW38

THE THANX IS ALL YOURS!!!

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