Nigerian govt reacts to students’ blockade of Lagos-Ibadan expressway, appeals for calm

The Federal Government on Wednesday faulted the decision of protesting members of the National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS) to block the Lagos-Ibadan expressway.

Members of NANS on Tuesday blocked the Lagos-Ibadan expressway to protest the ongoing strike by the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU).

Many road users spent more than 10 hours on the road as the protesters blocked both sides of the highway to express their displeasure with the federal government’s poor handling of the varsity lecturers’ grievances.

The Minister of Works and Housing, Babatunde Fashola, who addressed State House correspondents at the end of the weekly Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting in Abuja, said the Nigerian constitution forbids any citizen from “inflicting pain and inconveniencing other people.”

He said: “Once again, I apologise and empathise with commuters who need that place to get on with their lives. It’s the place we left to the last really because it’s the most built-up area, the last six kilometres into Lagos; very densely populated and occupied. There’s very little room for alternative routes for people. So, you just have to bear with us.

READ ALSO: Students block Lagos-Ibadan Expressway in protest against prolonged ASUU strike

“I also heard that some aggrieved students under the aegis of NANS are going to the road to protest. My respectful view is that it is not helpful at all to the citizens.

“The right to protest is a very well-protected right in our Constitution, but it does not include the right to inflict pain and inconvenience on other people. And so, whilst the protests can go on, they should refrain from blocking the road in order to do their protests. That in itself is a violation of law.”

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