The management of Ladoke Akintola University of Technology (LAUTECH) has resorted to intimidation, suppression and violation of the democratic rights of Nurse Olamide Thomas. Her crime is speaking truth to power in defence of Nigerian nurses. The university has refused to issue her BSc Nursing certificate in the wake of her exposé of how negligence on the part of the school authorities contributed to the death of eight nursing students of the institution. This is totally unacceptable. SWL demands the immediate and unconditional issuance of Nurse Thomas’s certificate.
As National Coordinator of the Elegant Nurses Forum, Thomas has been a beacon of struggle and hope for thousands of nurses and nursing students. She conscientiously brings cases of the violation of their human, trade union and labour rights to light, without fear and with utmost diligence to facts.
LAUTECH should be concerned with the message and address it, instead of victimising the messenger. The institution must stop practices that avoidably put students’ lives at risk. We demand an inquiry into the immediate and remote causes of the deaths of the eight nursing students. We demand an investigation into the reports of financial malfeasance and disrespect for the dignity of the students, which she has repeatedly unearthed.
Authoritarian tactics and lies cannot suppress the truth.Nor can these dampen the working-class activist spirit that Nurse Thomas has brought to bear with the ENF’s campaigns for justice, equity and fairness.
We urge the trade unions, civil society organisations and all we stand for social justice to join in demanding that the LAUTECH management and the Oyo state government take the necessary step to end this attempt at suppress her spirit, which they cannot achieve, issue her the BSc Nursing certificate forthwith and take action to remedy the tradition of negligence and malfeasance which she has boldly revealed.
Kelvin AYEMHENRE
National Chairperson
Amara NWOSU
National Secretary
