On issue of sexual harassment in OAU

For a university that took less than 24 hours to unjustly suspend Omole Ibukun, a student activist for a welfare protest he wasn’t present at and also remanded five of its students in Koshere prison for protesting anti-student policies in 2017 and 2018 respectively, taking a drastic action on allegations of sexual harassment against one of its lecturers three months after an official report is the least it can do to prove its non-tolerance of such conduct, especially in the face of overwhelming evidence and witnesses.

So, it is obvious that it is not a case that the university has not had enough time to prosecute the case to a point of logical conclusion as it so wishes, but it rather chose to foot-drag for reasons best known to them. It is more disturbing that since October 2019, the heaviest sanction the university has imposed is to cut the salary of the accused lecturer by half as claimed by the school’s Public Relations Officer. Practically, it is just like reducing the daily ration of a dog that is ‘notorious’ for biting people while still leaving it to roam freely. The question is, will the ration reduction stop it from biting? I strongly doubt if it requires a professorial degree to answer that.

Although, the university has done much to convince the public by portraying itself in the media as one that is intolerant of sexual harassment but those who are well-acquainted with the history of the institution regarding this culture will find it hard to fall into such entrapment. The menace of sexual harassment is not a strange development in OAU, it has always been an existent reality that a lot of students prefer to suffer in silence rather than report because of the awaiting retribution.

By now, I expect that the public would be pregnant with curiosity on the fact that this case is coming less than two years after another lecturer of the university was indicted for the same offence and it followed exactly the same pattern; office romance, seductive chats and most importantly, boastful confidence – as it can be seen in both cases that previous attempts by co-lecturers to prevail upon them failed. One would have thought that following the punishment meted to Professor Akindele and the disgraceful exposure of randy lecturers in the recent sex-for-grade BBC video documentary would have made the act a forgotten issue in Nigerian universities.

However, the reverse is the case and particularly in OAU where it is becoming a recurring issue. What this should imply is that the randy lecturers are either affected by a strange condition that has made it impossible for them to desist or they are deliberately perpetrating the act because they are enabled by a system that has no regard for students’ plights and would always protect one of its own.

The attack on the Students’ Union has further created an enabling environment for the predatory lecturers who consider their targets ‘powerless’. All of these do not only point to the fact that the university is creating an enabling environment for sexual misconduct, it’s continuous delay in finalising the report of the probe panel is suggestive of a protective method we are too familiar with.

Dunnex Samuel,

Ile Ife