Text of a Press Conference by Igbomina Professionals Association (IPA) on the proposed Kwara State University of Education held on January 6, 2024, at NUJ Press Centre, Ilorin, Kwara State
Gentlemen of the Press, I heartily welcome you to this press briefing. First of all, let me wish you all a Happy New Year.
The Igbomina Professionals Association is a group of professionals from all walks of life who are indigenes of Igbomina communities in Kwara State. Our members are resident across the country and the Diaspora.
These members have used their hard-earned resources and expertise to proffer solutions to problems such as insecurity, poor education, poor healthcare delivery, unemployment, and communal clashes, etc. bedevilling our communities.
Like every well-meaning Kwaran, we were highly elated when news went round that the state government was planning to establish a University of Education in the state.
Gentlemen of the press, we have invited you here today to state why the proposed Kwara State University of Education should be sited in Igbomina land and not anywhere else.
We submitted a memorandum as requested by the 11-man panel constituted in November l
2023 by our exemplary Governor, Mallam AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq but we are disturbed by the utterances of some groups demanding that the proposed University be located in Ilorin the State Capital where more than 90 percent of the State government and Federal institutions are presently located.
In order to drive home our points, we would like to trace the history of higher education in the state from its creation on May 27, 1967.
The first higher institution owned by the state, the Kwara State College of Technology (now Kwara State Polytechnic), was established in 1973 and sited in Ilorin, the state Capital with two of its foundation schools, the School of Engineering and the School of Management and Vocation, located in Ilorin.
The University of Ilorin, established by the Federal Military government in 1975, is also sited in Ilorin, the state capital.
It is pertinent to note that the College of Education, Ilorin, was originally conceived and established as College Education, Oro, an Igbomina community, but located inside Ilorin.
The Kwara State University, Malete, is located in Ilorin.
It is also important to note that KWASU Teaching Hospital, formerly General Hospital, and the University of Ilorin Teaching Hospital are in Ilorin township. Also, the Kwara State College of Arabic and Islamic Legal Studies (KWCAILS), Kwara State College of Nursing and Midwifery, Kwara State Football Academy, Kwara State College of Aviation, Kwara State College of Agriculture, and Michael Imoudu National Institute of Labour Studies (MINILS), and the newly established Federal Neuropsychiatric Hospital are all in Ilorin.
Without prejudice to the right of any section of the state to seek to attract development projects to its area, We are taken aback by the spirited demand by the Ilorin Emirate Descendants Progressive Union (IEDPU) that the proposed Kwara State University of Education be sited in Ilorin
not minding the fact that the state capital is already saturated with state government-owned and Federal tertiary educational institutions to the detriment of the two other senatorial zones of the state!
This, to all intents and purposes, will be unjust and repudiates justice, equity, and fairness.
We believe that the concentration of these institutions and other amenities in Ilorin have led to the uneven development and huge rural-urban migration in the state.
Gentlemen of the Press, Igbomina land occupies a large portion of the State, and contributes a large percentage of citizenry and resources to the state, yet there is no single public university and establishment, which could provide jobs and developments for our people and the entire Igbomina land.
We also wish to state that Igbomina land has a vast land suitable for educational institutions like the proposed University of Education.
We believe that the location of a government university in Igbomina land will boost government programmes and attract businesses in their different forms and other developmental projects.
It will also enhance and promote the government’s inclusion of Igbomina people in its scheme of development.
Igbomina land also offers a serene and peaceful environment required for academic work and intellectual activities.
Gentlemen of the press, we believe that our Governor, His Excellency, Mallam AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq, is a decent and fair-minded leader who will consider our request for justice and fairness in the establishment of this University.
We believe he will listen to us and site this university in Igbomina land.
God bless Igbominaland.
God bless Kwara State.
God bless the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
I thank you for listening, and I am ready to take a few questions.
Barrister Bayo Atoyebi
President, Igbomina Professionals Association (IPA)
January 6th, 2024
