By Aiman Fodio
As a concerned rank-and-file student at Abubakar Tafawa Balewa University (ATBU), let me say this. Look around this group. We are on different levels: some have been here for nearly a decade, some for five years, some for six. It is a whole spectrum of experience. But I want you to pause and ask yourself one question: What have you observed about student leadership over your time here?
Aren’t these complaints we are lodging day in, day out, the same old tunes we have grown familiar with? What tangible change have you witnessed across the number of administrations you have seen come and go? The script, sadly, never changes. The concerns are always the same: school fees increment, access to accommodations, and, just recently, the NELFUND refund joined the party. And let’s not forget the usual guest stars—water and light issues—making their regular appearance.
The most painful part? The approach to these problems remains the same every time, so much so that you could write the Students’ Union Government’s response in your sleep. “We are in dialogue with management.” “We implore students to remain calm.” “We are aware of your plight.” It is a tired liturgy. But let us be fair—exempt that issue of protest. The real tragedy is that the SUG is often not given proper regard by the management. An SUG President will struggle to secure a simple appointment with the VC. If a concession will not work out, then… wallahi, this daily complaint cycle will never work out. Nothing will change.
This is precisely why people like me, who once stood a chance, withdrew our interest from the beginning. I speak from the inside: from my time in Gamji Memorial Club to serving as a serial senator, Chief Whip, and even Deputy Senate President in the SUG Parliament. I’ve seen the engine room. I have been asked so many times by those who saw this trajectory. “Why not run for SUG President?” They ask. The answer is these limits and the remote control. They make you lose interest because you know, no matter your passion or plan, you will ultimately fail those who gave you their loyalty and support. The structure is designed to frustrate genuine agency.
Why do our student leaders fail? Or, rather, why does the system ensure they cannot succeed? Both questions are intertwined. Off the top of my head, I can identify at least three (out of one hundred) reasons. One, a leadership selection process based on popularity and empty promises, not pragmatic skill. Two, a university management structure that sees student leadership as a necessary nuisance to be managed, not a partner in welfare. Three, the domination of the SUG space by the politically ambitious, rather than the service-oriented.
In this matter, I will dwell on the first: our own role as students in choosing the wrong pilots. It could be emotional: we vote for the most charismatic orator, the one who throws the biggest parties, the one with the slickest posters. It could be tribal: we vote based on faculty, department, or state of origin. It could also be a result of a poor understanding of the depth of the challenges ahead. We set our leaders up for a verdict of failure from the campaign period onward. We want them to fix in one semester what has been broken for a decade, and when they cannot perform magic, we brand them as sell-outs.
I have been there before. In my first year, I was a staunch supporter of a particular SUG presidential candidate. He spoke like Fela, promised like Obama, and had a slogan that was on everyone’s lips. Upon visiting our hostel to campaign, he was wowed by our living conditions. He said if a student could live like this, then he had his work cut out for him. I started promoting him as the leader who would finally make management listen. At the time, I saw management’s deaf ear as our only problem. I did not take kindly to any criticism of my candidate. But less than three months into his administration, I had turned to his critic. It was a case of disappointed love.
For one, I couldn’t stand some of his executives. I said if this man really wanted to fight for us, as he staunchly promised in his manifesto, some persons should not have been in his cabinet. When he started talking about “understanding management’s constraints,” I was incensed. All my life as a student, I had argued that students, being the reason the university exists, should enjoy basic dignity. I refused to evaluate or accept any administrative arguments. I concluded he had been compromised, as I was more interested in the militant implications. Meanwhile, our water situation got worse. I held him liable for failing to lead a strong protest as he had promised during his campaign.
That was how our dear messiah began to unravel. Ahead of the next election, I had found another messiah in a final-year student known for his fearless critiques of management on social media. I said this was the fighter we needed! By then, I was already in the parliament, seeing the gap between fiery speeches on the floor and actual results from the executive. I remember arguing for him in a hostel lounge. My friend, who was in the School of Environmental Technology, called to ask me, jokingly: “So how much did he pay you for this?” With that candidate’s dream going nowhere, I gave up on my search for a student messiah. Instead, I started thinking: “Let’s make do with what we have.”
That was why, when the next candidate was being marketed as the “bridge-builder” and “technocrat,” I was calm. I had become a realist. My worldview had evolved. Even later, as Chairman of the Bauchi Axis for NAUS, I saw how student politics at every level face the same structural walls. I had looked deeply at ATBU’s power dynamics and its complications. I said this candidate, relatively connected, would only try, but not much would change. The water problem he inherited only worsened as more hostels were built. Rather than face this common threat, the SUG and management resorted to politicking and finger-pointing. Meanwhile, frustration grabbed us by the neck, but only the SUG President carried the blame.
As we later saw, all the politicking was geared towards securing a peaceful tenure and a good recommendation letter from management. The cycle continued. That is how overmarketing begins again every election. People who previously abused and rejected a candidate become pilots of their campaign, creating fables and fantasies. I am so worried for the next set that I will say this: God help the next SUG President if, by their second semester, hostels still lack water; if the electricity is more off than on; if the NELFUND issue is still unresolved; and if accommodation is still a blood sport. They won’t find it funny!
Let me be very clear: there is nothing wrong with having expectations. In fact, to expect nothing will be a tragedy. However, ATBU will not change overnight—no matter what any SUG candidate promises, or how their supporters sell them. The management structure is rigid. We can’t reduce fees or increase water supply within the twinkling of an eye. Many good things take time and persistent, intelligent pressure. We don’t need to be deceived, or to deceive ourselves, at election times.
What then? We need to temper our pre-election expectations and sharpen our post-election engagement. We need to vote for the gritty pragmatist with a three-point welfare plan (Water. Light. Health.) over the flamboyant orator with a 50-page manifesto. We must look out for signs of diligent pressure and creative advocacy to avoid concluding within a month that a leader has failed. A President who fails to secure a fee reduction but installs and maintains 10 new boreholes has not failed entirely. Selling every candidate as a messiah is the issue, but even if they were the messiah, could they succeed in this system? That is the question.
But we must also demand that management stop seeing the SUG as a kindergarten government. A student leader who must beg for three weeks to see the VC is set up for ridicule and failure. Until that relationship is recalibrated into one of respectful engagement, we will remain here, singing the same songs of lament. It is all politics—and, sadly, politics in which the most important voters, the students, often empower the very system that frustrates them.
AND FOUR OTHER THINGS…
THE CV CANDIDATE
We must be wary of the candidate whose entire campaign seems designed to add a glossy line to their CV. You can spot them by their focus on “organising flagship events” and “international partnerships” while being vague on hostel water pressure. Their tenure is often a series of photo-ops with management, culminating in a glowing reference letter while the student’s condition remains unchanged. Ambition.
THE QUIET LOBBYIST
Conversely, let us not discount the quiet lobbyist. The one who may not be great on Twitter but is always in the Dean’s office, presenting costed proposals for water tankers or negotiating small but real wins on exam deadlines. This approach lacks drama and doesn’t fuel the “activist” brand, but it sometimes yields the only tangible results we see. Pragmatism.
MANAGEMENT’S BLIND SPOT
The university management often forgets that a frustrated, disrespected student body is a tinderbox. By neutering the SUG and denying it genuine agency, they create an environment in which peaceful channels are seen as useless, making spontaneous, unmanageable unrest more likely. It is a profound failure of strategic thinking. Shortsighted.
OUR COLLECTIVE AMNESIA
Finally, we, the students, suffer from collective amnesia. Every new election cycle, we get swept up in new promises and forget the lessons of the past three administrations. We refuse to hold candidates to their predecessor’s failed promises. Until we develop an institutional memory and vote based on record and realistic plans, we will be forever disappointed. Cycle.
Aiman Fodio is the former Executive Chairman of the National Association of University Students (NAUS) Bauchi Axis and a serial legislator during his time in ATBU Unionism. He is currently a final year student of ATBU.