Mass-based students’ unionism and cultism

Kola Ibrahim & Ayo Ademiluyi

After the mass movement against cultism in the wake of July 10, 1999 cult killing of five students of OAU, Ile-Ife, one would have thought that the menace is gone for good on our campuses, but the story is completely different today. Over twenty persons including students were recently killed by cult groups in a suburb town of Benin, Edo State. This aside various criminal activities such as broad day light robbery, intimidation of fellow students and the community, rape, etc which are going on in various campuses and affiliated communities. In University of Ibadan, The Polytechnic Ibadan, University of Benin, Ambrose Alli University, students witness these horrible situation daily. Even in private universities, cultism is fast rearing its ugly heads in a wild form that will be worse when they got to outside society, as these are children of the wealthy few in the society.
One general trend in most of these institutions is the absence of a viable, radical, independent and issue-based students’ movement that will be at the head of students’ agitations. Tragic-comically, it is the same tertiary institutions’ managements that proscribed (or bought over) active students’ unionism on the basis of causing ‘riots’ on campuses that are now spending millions on security votes or worse still paying cult groups not to cause clashes on campuses! However, even in Obafemi Awolowo University (OAU), Ile-Ife, where there is history of radical student unionism, cultism is rearing its heads again. Just few weeks ago, cultists were heard threatening student leaders while cases of rapes and robbery cases are being reported on campus. Also, internet fraudsters otherwise known as yahoo-yahoo boys along with their money-freaky girlfriends are becoming wilder on campus than ever.
With the bloodlust and merciless killings going on in the name of cultism, the need arises to look into the rise, background and possible overflow of cult violence in the coming period. Hiding under the guise of caring for their devotees, these campus cults have over the past two decades entrenched their diabolical tentacles across the different institutions of learning, tertiary and while pre-varsity and secondary schools have become a viable breeding ground for these outlawed elements leaving in their trail the blood of their prey.
As it were, successive political administrations, while masquerading to be bent on halting this hydra-headed monster have been found out to have seen a willing tool in the campus cultists in maiming genuine students’ rights activists, eliminating perceived political enemies and sustaining their hold on power.

Read Also: Unilever named second best company to work in Nigeria

Cultism has even become an alluring enterprise for many youths who are daily traumatized with the forlorn state of the economy which makes the barely-literate politicians of the ruling class heaping millions into their private pockets while the average Nigerian graduate can hardly find a suitable job of eke living for himself. Cultism to the intellectually-blind youth is therefore an alternative as it is a fast and easy route to riches as they engage in ‘goldmine crimes, ranging from armed robbery, gunrunning to drug pushing, and online frauds even to prostitution all of which has one form of attachment or the other to cultism.
Campus confraternities can be traced to the formation of Pyrates Confraternity at University of Ibadan (UI), then a university college under the tutelage of London University, Britain, which ascribed to itself the task of combating perceived colonial induced societal ills, especially as it concerns the cultural colonization. This agitation against cultural colonization is justified when one considers the fact that Nigerian students (of University College, Ibadan, and other quasi/pre-tertiary educational institutions) were forced to turned to adopted Europeans but only get second hand jobs even if they have the same qualification with a typical European. However, the problem of the founders of Pyrates is the contradiction created by their approach. While they claim to be fighting colonization, they adopted one of the features of western students’ lives – formation of fraternities on campuses for which many American campuses are notorious. Worse still, students were then seen as elite as there were less than 400 undergraduates in the whole country then, which makes their activities isolated from the struggle of the nation’s oppressed class workers (in Udi Coal mines, railway, etc), peasants, petty traders, who were then waging economic and political struggles against the European overlords, that later culminated in flag independence that put Nigerian bourgeois class of different shades in power. The failure of this conscious section of privileged Nigerian students to link their agitation with that of the oppressed class isolated them from the general perspective of struggle for change. This was even expressed by their secret methods of organizations which led to uncontrollable internal chasm and opportunism.
It was this that led to the breakaway of a group that formed Eiye confraternity. Further breakup of the Pyrates and Eiye confraternities formed the Bucaneers with others like Klansmen Konfraternity (KK), Supreme Vikings Confraternity and Adventurers emerging under military rule. As against the noble ideals with which these confraternities claimed they started with, they have heightened tension within campuses from the 1980’s to the 90’s and the 2000’s with fierce struggles for supremacy among the groups. Female cults like Daughter of Jezebel, Black Brassiere also emerged as responses to the all-pervasive chauvinism and male domination on campuses combined with coincidental interest of the girl friends of members of the male cult groups. It is worth stating that one of the reasons for the degeneration of these cult groups from the ideals of its founders is the mismanagement of the economy and the bankrupt political tendencies exemplified by the military rulers and their civilian collaborators.
As the economy grew worse, no thanks to the plunders in power (and their foreign collaborators), coupled with attacks on fundamental human rights with impunity by the powers-that-be, which saw attacks on platforms of resistance against economic and political plundering (ASUU, NANS, labour movements, NBA, etc), many youth and students used the vehicle of isolation, secrecy and egotism provided by confraternities to participate in the might-is-right macabre dance of the ruling class. This was ably funded by children of the rich and powerful in the society who wanted to create identity for themselves, the same way their parents create theirs through the use of armed security agents, bull-dogs and private securities (?). In fact, many big business use cult ‘guys’ to maintain and protect their obscene wealth, and settle scores with their business and political opponents. Therefore, it can be summarized that campus cultism in Nigeria is deeply rooted in our dysfunctional society where obscene inequality, degrading poverty, mismanagement, corruption, political bankruptcy, etc hold sway. Cult groups across campuses in Nigeria have been affirmed to be deeply connected with militant groups in the Niger Delta, who use the genuine agitation of the people for selfish pecuniary interest.