RE: The Legal Perspective of the MPC Rule and Role of Management in the Recent Students Uprising in Niger Delta University.

RE: The Legal Perspective of the MPC Rule and Role of Management in the Recent Students Uprising in Niger Delta University.

 

Niger Delta University

Having been duly briefed on the M.P.C. regulation in the Niger Delta University, I write to state that the law passed by the institution was duly passed in the eyes of the Law.

This is coming after a studio session with the school repreatative Ebipadou Sapre-Obi who I was squared against on Royalfm 95.5 Yenagoa 'X-ray' program. The rule which is aimed at improving the performance of students have caused an unenvisaged hardships on students following the riot that rocked the school with the enforcement of the rule.

I which to reiterate the fact that I did not intend to encourage mediocrity in our schools with my earlier publication, but was only concerned about the position of the law and to ensure that in dealing with the issue, the school follows strictly, the provisions of the Law.

I want to admonish the students of Faculty of Engineering, to be Law abiding, especially those affected by such rule and those who have been asked to withdraw from the University, to comply.

Having said that, I call on the University to reconsider its sanction against the students as it will be fanning injustice in the institution to punish those who actually perpetrated the act of violence in the school and those who did not take part alike. Citing section 24 of the Criminal Code as my reason.

In order to get the best out of students, the Universities should also do everything it can to ensure that students are being protected agianst exploitation. Some of those students who failed M. P.C. did not fail because they were intellectually inept. There should be some quality of assurance in the results. University is a citadel of learning and therefore academic hard work and diligence should be duly rewarded as students have the right to sit for and pass examination, a test or other promotional or professional exercise embarked upon by the school authorities, which is implicit in the right to enroll in a school. If a student have performed well, the better he or she has performed, the better he or she is expected to pass. These are intrisic rights to education and not to be victimized as it is in most of the case.

The school should have done thorough investigation into the matter before coming up with such stringent sanctions. If such investigation is carried out, then responsibility should lie at the doorstep of those indicted. Those implicated should be given an ample time of fair hearing, as a student cannot be suspended or expelled from campus without being heard on the allegations against him, neither can he be punished or liable for an offence within the University without having being heard on the allegations levelled against him. Glymn v Keel University (1971) 1 W.L.R 487.

Students have the right to put in writing, addressed to the Senate of the University with proof, that they should be exempted from responsibility of the mayhem.

Aluzu Ebikebuna Augustine

Hon. Aluzu Ebikebuna Augustine.

Member representing Constituency III

LAWSAN House of Representatives

University of Uyo, Uyo.