"One Man's Law?": Presidential Aspirant Decries Abuse of Power by LSS CTC Chairman

Mazeed Mukhtar Oyeleye writes,

The Usmanu Danfodiyo University, Sokoto's (UDUS) Law Faculty is fast becoming a stable of premium theatrical displays. Events of the past few weeks—including alleged foul play in the faculty's LSS judiciary followed by the Chief Judge's unequivocal 'promise' of "damnable consequences" to the News Digest Press—have likened the hallowed Fodiyo Varsity Law Village to the Shakespeare's Globe in London.

The events leading up to the outburst of the favourite presidential aspirant of the Law Students Society (LSS) of UDUS, via a petition against the Caretaker Committee Chairman of the society, on Friday, January 3, strongly suggest that the university community has not seen the last of dramatic episodes from the Fodiyo Varsity's nursery of learned fellows.

Masaud Daudu Umar, a 400-level student at the UDUS Faculty of Law, addressed a petition, titled "COMPLAIN FOR BIAS AND ABUSE OF POWER BY LSS PRESIDENT/ CTC CHAIRMAN MIKAILU ABUBAKAR DATTI" to the Law Clinic of the university, reporting "the misconduct and abuse of power done by the LSS CTC chairman, Abubakar Datti" and seeking redress to his malfeasance.

In this petition, the complainant noted that Datti, the petitionee, was bias in his dealings as the LSS president "in the sense that he has a personal interest to nominate Shuaibu Bashir Musa also known as Rimawa", alleging that this decision was also obvious to members of the society's executive committee.

In the petition, Umar referred to an assurance Datti gave him on January 27, that the office of the LSS President was "still open as they [LSS Executives] are in dilemma of who to appoint to that position" and that he will include Umar's name among the contenders for the role, whom the executives will consider before selecting the next president. However, he maintained that the society's executives did meet regarding the next president, accusing the Chairman of preventing the Excos from meeting regarding the society's presidency and denying them a say in who succeeds him.

"From 27th January to 2nd February 2023, I was never caught lobbying for Datti because I want the nomination to be free and fair [and] based on the approval of the majority. It was on Thursday, 2nd February 2023, that I met Datti at ETF2 and asked him about their decision, then he told me that my class members, LLB4, have already nominated a candidate. Then I said to him that the class was never aware of this [as] it was the decision of some individuals, which are only 16 or 17 students out of 85 members that we have in class. Then Datti said to me that if really I know that the name submitted to him wasn't from the class, then I should go back to the class and tell them that we should vote among the members, and the person with the highest votes shall be the nominee of the class and such person shall be the next LSS President, else he will use the name given to him by those individuals. He gave me a deadline that he thought I can't meet up with," the petition continued.

TALES OF DOUBLE STANDARDS

Sequel to Datti's request for the LLB4 class to democratize the nomination of the next LSS president, the class representative, Ahmad Aliyu, ran a poll on the Whatsapp platform of the class, which lasted for about 2 hours. The poll ended with a total of 19 votes, with Umar leading with 9, and other contestants, Adam Ismail and Shuaibu Bashir Musa Rimawa following with 8 and 2 votes, respectively. The results proved that Umar was the choice LSS president of the class.

The results, in the words of the LLB4 class representative, read;

"ALHAMDULILLAH.

"From what we have here the following are the results;

"RIMAWA 2 votes

"ADAM.    8 votes

"MAS'UD.  9 votes

"With that, we say the class declared MAS'UD AS the next L.S.S PRESIDENT.

On this notes, we urge our able class Assistant Rep to communicate the outcome of the results to the L.S.S PRESIDENT as he/they required being an EXCO also Class Representative. Thanks"

However, according to the petition, when the Assistant Class representative, Jemeelah Idris, communicated the outcome of the class elections to the LSS president, he "raised his voice on her and he also used harsh words on her and they ended the conversation".

The petioner also  noted that he also called "Datti more than 3 times, but he refused to answer my call. And I also sent him a text message that he did not also reply. It was after juma'ah prayer that he called me and make it obvious to me that he will not use what the class as a whole presented to him, that he want me to go back to those 17 individuals [who nominated a candidate on behalf of the LLB4 class] to acknowledge me before he will consider me. And he immediately went ahead to publish the name of Shuaibu Bashir Musa as the new LSS CTC chairman and he scheduled to hand over to him tomorrow on the 4th February at the Moot Court hall of Faculty of Law, Usmanu Danfodiyo University, Sokoto".

AND CONTRADICTIONS ABOUND

Reacting to Umar's accusation that the LSS president sidelined fellow executives in reaching the decisions regarding the presidency of the society, the Secretary of the LSS, Sabo Biniya Abubakar, noted that the Excos met to finalize following the recommendations of a committee they formed to ease the transition process.

In his words, "We resolved the issue of the incoming Exco, which was based on the unanimous agreement of the respective levels. The practice is that the president must be a 500 level student, i.e 400 going to five. So to make it easier we formed a [four-man] committee to that effect, the committee consulted the various classes in respect of the various posts for each class. And we deliberated on it after the committee consultations".

However, the class representative of the LLB4 class, which Umar is a part of, maintained that he was not aware, at any time before the WhatsApp polls on Friday, January 3, that any of his class members nominated anyone or got nominated for the LSS Judiciary presidency.

PEN Press also contacted the LSS president, Mikailu Abubakar Datti, to get his views on the allegations against him. He noted that "I'm occupied now. I'll get back to you. Bare with me". However, as of the time of filing this report, he is yet to offer further information on the matter.

A CRY FOR JUSTICE

Umar closed his petition, in which he copied the offices of the Deans of the Student Affairs Division and the Law Faculty, the Head of Departments at the faculty, the Student Union and LAWSAN presidents, the LSS Judiciary and the entire Law students in the university; requesting his declaration as the new LSS President in tune with the choice of his coursemates as  necessitated by Datti and the outright rejection of his 'autocratic' decisions. He also tasked stakeholders to prevent the proposed handing over from taking place on Saturday, February 4, 2023 and to query and censure Mikailu Abubakar Datti for misusing his power against the will of the majority.