2018/2019 Nigerian Law School Class From Oyo Denies Receiving N500,000, Bursary Fee From Gov. Makinde – TheNigerialawyer

By Chima Osuji

The regular Class of 2018/2019 Oyo State Law Students have
described the recent disbursement of bursary for law students of
Oyo descent by the Seyi Makinde-led administration as misleading
for want of adequate representation, justice and equity. This claim
was made by the President of the indigenous student body, Kolapo
Sodiq Abidemi, in an interview with one of our correspondents.

According to Kolapo, his colleagues across the six campuses did
not get a dime from the largesse as a result of misinformation
given to the governor by the representative of the beneficiary set
who claimed his set had already graduated from the law school.

Sodiq regarded the information as untrue stating that their
results are yet to be released and that they are yet to be called
to the Nigerian Bar. He also stated that the official list
containing the names of the Oyo students of both sets he and his
team obtained from the Law School, was frustrated by officials of
the state government.

In his words:

“I am the president of the NLS Oyo state indigenes. We set out
to collect bursary from the state. The state was ready to pay us.
Then we had an issue, they requested we got our names of those who
chose Oyo as the State of origin from Law school. Law school was in
the process of sending the names when we heard the Governor had
approved 500k bursary to Oyo state indigenes in law school. Law
school sent the names to us and we gave it to them but they
requested law school sent it directly to them.”

“This came before the approval of the
bursary

Then we realized the Governor approved the bursary to backlog
students, being misguided by a misrepresentation of the backlog’s
chairman that our set had graduated. We informed the Governor that
we have not graduated. We reached him through all the avenues we
had. He reached out to us that he’s going to do something to it.
Something like collation of names of both sets.”

“To our utter dismay, the Governor refused to go on with the
collation. We requested law school to send a comprehensive list of
both sets’ names and they did. He apologized subsequently on a
radio programme. And he had paid those guys yesterday. But we’re
offended because, one, our right was infringed upon, paying
backlog’s students at the expense of regular students.”

“Two, he announced that he approved 500k each to each law school
students of Oyo origin, this had damaged many of us because till
now, friends and families think we’re paid. Thirdly, he
misrepresented us again by misleading the public saying he had paid
all law school students of Oyo origin.”

“Only God knows the number of calls I have received from friends
to share my 500k with them, how do I explain to them?”

“We later realized he paid those guys based on political
affiliation and the saddened thing is, because the names of the
beneficiaries were not gotten from law school, some beneficiaries
are not indigenes. We want to make all these facts known to the
public”.

Representative of the Beneficiaries Reacts:

The representative of the 2019/2020 backlog set, Mr. Olaniyi
Adisa Ogunlade, has dismissed the allegation leveled against him by
the regular set as untrue while giving his own side of the
story.

According to him, the secret behind the bursary payment to his
group was a forum he created on WhatsApp called, Forum of Oyo State
Indigenes at the Nigerian Law School, consisting of members from
only three campuses—Yenagoa, Yola and Abuja—with the objective of
securing bursary payment from the state government.

In his words:

“Actually, that’s not true. When I got admitted into the
Nigerian Law School in April, I was at the Yenagoa campus, and
immediately, I established a forum called Forum of Oyo State
Indigenes at the Nigerian Law School, that was the forum I
established via WhatsApp. I tried as much as possible to send a
link to the three campuses that were used for the backlog
set—Yenagoa, Abuja and Yola—because the 2019/2020 is a backlog set
and my members were joining.”

“It was a voluntary association and one of the mandates, the
vision for that forum is, let’s try as much as possible to see how
we can appeal to the state government to pay us bursary allowance.
So, we’ve been on it when we were on campus. We’ve been talking,
romancing, dialoguing, having normal interaction among ourselves.
So, at the end of the day on that forum platform, I requested for
members to be submitting their names, local government of origin,
University they graduated from, and their campuses, which they were
all doing on that platform.”

“I took out time personally to collate all the lists. I did
everything on my own. So, when we came to Ibadan for externship, we
wrote a letter requesting for a courtesy visit to His Excellency.
The reason was to congratulate him on his emergence as the
Executive Governor of Oyo State. God gave it to us, we were able to
push that letter, and got an audience with His Excellency.”

“I led the 7-man delegation, spoke on behalf of my forum and
presented a gift to him. I then pleaded on behalf of members of my
forum for bursary and right there and then, His Excellency
requested for the list of my members and I gave it to him because I
already prepared it. It contained 120 names of my members. On that
spot, His Excellency approved the sum of #500,000 each to us. That
was how the news went viral.”

Adisa however admitted that not all backlog students benefited
from the bursary, a fall out of their failure to send their details
as at the time of collating the lists. He also claimed ignorance of
the existence of the regular set during the planning and execution
stages, saying he simply acted for members of his forum only.

The Position of the State Government

It could be recalled that the governor of Oyo State, Oluseyi
Abiodun Makinde, had announced on August 6, 2019 via his Twitter
handle that the state had approved the sum of sixty million for Oyo
State Indigenes at the Nigerian Law School.

In a live broadcast marking his 100th day in office, Seyi
Makinde identified the payment of bursary to its Indigenes at the
Nigerian Law School as one of his achievements.

“…provision of the law school students’ bursary to the
unprecedented amount of #500,000. The bursary payment had been
suspended since 2012…”

When asked by a journalist why members of the regular set during
the press briefing, Mr Governor expressly stated that he was
informed that they had graduated and apologised for their loss. He
however promised to place them on scholarship and making adequate
preparation for the two sets that will be admitted to the Law
School in 2020.

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