The Socialist 25 October 2007

Public health not private wealth

Join the 3 November NHS demonstration

NHS: What the Socialist Party says

March to save the NHS

Michael Moore's latest film 'Sicko' reviewed

Huddersfield SOS: Class fighters' bold initiative

Reject Royal Mail deal: Vote 'No' and reinstate the action

Striking Liverpool postal workers return to work

Why workers need a new party

Respect in crisis - what lessons for socialists?

Socialism 2007

Pakistan: Suicide bombings at Bhutto rally

Turkey's invasion threat increases regional instability

Release Saburi Akande Akinola, Taiwo Hassan Soweto and Olatunde Dairo now

France: Biggest public transport strike action since 1995

Do women still have the 'right to choose'?

Liberal Democrat leadership: Two candidates, one background, no answers

Classroom assistants challenge the Stormont Assembly

Who's to blame for teenage obesity?

Glasgow: On strike for a fair deal

Train drivers prepare for action

Fight Cadbury's factory closure

Teachers' union election – time to change!

BBC threatens hundreds of jobs

Previous issues, etc

Print this issue

PO Box 1398, Enfield EN1 9GT

020 8988 8777

[email protected]

Link to this page: https://www.socialistparty.org.uk/issue/507/3339

Search the site	Printable version

Home | The Socialist 25 October 2007 | Join the Socialist Party

Subscribe | Donate

Nigeria: Student leaders framed on murder charges

Release Saburi Akande Akinola, Taiwo Hassan Soweto and Olatunde Dairo now

THREE STUDENT leaders of a major Nigerian university are being held in prison on trumped-up charges of conspiracy to murder. They were elected by the students of Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile Ife, to fight against plans of the university and state authorities to commercialise and undermine education provision and to attack the students' rights to organise and resist.

The Osun State Director of Public Prosecutions, hand in glove with the university authorities and with the fraudulently elected state government, ordered the latest arrests to try and break the union and head off campus protests agreed at a mass meeting on October 11.

The authorities closed the university [now re-opened] and suspended a total of 13 student activists - many of who are members and supporters of the Education Rights Campaign.

Boycotts of lectures and other actions were due to start this week to demand the release of the president of the students union who has been held since the end of July on a whole series of similarly trumped-up charges, including conspiracy to murder the former Vice-Chancellor in 2004.

Those behind this attack on the students' democratic rights are closely linked with the looters of Nigeria's oil wealth.

The Campaign for Democratic and Workers' Rights in Nigeria is calling for an avalanche of protests to be sent to the authorities demanding the immediate release of the students and the dropping of all charges against them. Campaigners in Nigeria are calling for worldwide protest pickets and solidarity demonstrations to take place at embassies and High Commissions on 23 October.

On that day, a mass procession is planned to go to the Court in Oshogbo where the bail application of Akinola Saburi, the students' union president, is due to be heard.