The sole ownership of the Ladoke Akintola University of Technology, Ogbomoso (LAUTECH) by Oyo State is a welcome development. Joint ownership of the institution by Oyo and Osun State has culminated into protracted crises which has had telling effects on the students, the staff, the rating of the institution as well as the relationship between the owner states. This is why the dissolution of the joint ownership and taking over of the institution by Oyo State Government is applauded.
However, the news credited to the Oyo State Governor, Engr. Seyi Makinde that the institution would be run as a multi-campus institution is a sad news for all Ogbomoso indigenes. The governor was said to have made the declaration when some students of LAUTECH went to Governor’s office on an “Appreciation Walk” and basically to thank him for his efforts thus far in stabilising the crises-ridden institution.
This piece is to advise the Oyo State Government to reconsider the idea in the interest of peaceful coexistence among the various zones of the state which is a homogenous state. Numerically and population wise, Ogbomoso geo-political zone comprising five local government areas is second to Ibadan. The only government institution in Ogbomoso zone is Ladoke Akintola University of Technology, The founding fathers of the Institution sited the school in Ogbomoso because they thought that the town deserved the institution at the period because out of all the zones that made up the old Oyo state, only Ogbomoso was deprived of a higher institution.
This is not to mean that Ogbomoso as a town or an administrative zone owned the school, the school until recently belonged to Osun and Oyo States and with the dissolution of the joint ownership, it belongs to Oyo State and its people and for the benefit of the humanity. However, the siting of the school in Ogbomoso has transformed socio and economic life of the town for the better, one could better imagine the adverse effects the multi-campus nature for the university would cause.
Besides, all other major zones in the State already have State Institutions located in their respective zones and space would not allow further elaboration. In my own opinion, what should be uppermost in the mind of the present administration after winning the struggle to dissolve the joint ownership is how to meet the financial need of the university. Dismembering the institution as the government is planning is not the way to stabilise the school after years of instability; rather it would mean solving a problem to create another one.
Adewuyi Adegbite,
ayekooto05@gmail.com.
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