ASUU STRIKE: students blocking Lagos-Ibadan expressway are breaking the law- FG

ASUU STRIKE: students blocking Lagos-Ibadan expressway are breaking the law- FG

The National Association of Nigerian Students, NANS, protesters who stopped a busy part of the Lagos-Ibadan expressway on Wednesday were accused by the Federal Government of “violating” the law.

This was said by the Minister of Works and Housing, Babatunde Fashola, SAN, after the weekly Federal Executive Council, FEC, meeting, which was held in the Council Chamber of the Presidential Villa in Abuja under the chairmanship of President Muhammadu Buhari.

According to the Minister, the Constitution of Nigeria (as amended) recognises and protects citizens’ right to public protests but does not empower any Nigerian to “inflict pain and inconvenience on other people.”

Following reports that the NANS protest on Tuesday caused a bottleneck on the Lagos-Ibadan expressway, leaving drivers and passengers stuck, the Ministet provided an explanation.

The demonstration happened right after the expressway’s Sagamu Interchange portion, heading towards Lagos.

The Academic Staff Union of Universities, or ASUU, has been on strike for seven months. The protesting students held placards with various invocations and sang songs of solidarity as they expressed their outrage.

To make their point that the strike must end, they pledged to occupy a major highway and other locations.

But fielding question from journalists on the recurrent gridlock on the uncompleted sections of the highway, Fashola appealed for more patience from Nigerians saying that there is no alternative route in the already built-up areas.

He said “Once again, I apologise and empathise with commuters who need that place to get on with their lives. It’s the place we left to the last really because it’s the most built-up area, the last six kilometers into Lagos; very densely populated and occupied. There’s very little room for alternative routes for people. So, you just have to bear with us.

“I also heard that some aggrieved students under the aegis of NANS are going to the road to protest. My respectful view is that is not helpful at all to the citizens.

“The right to protest is a very well-protected right in our Constitution, but it does not include the right to inflict pain and inconvenience on other people. And so, whilst the protests can go on, they should refrain from blocking the road in order to do their protests. That in itself is a violation of law.”