Police ask Kwara students not to shut down Ilorin airport during the ASUU strike

Police ask Kwara students not to shut down Ilorin airport during the ASUU strike.

Invoking the violence and devastation that followed the EndSARS protest in 2020, the police warned that thugs could hijack the demonstration.

Paul Odama, the police commissioner in Kwara, has urged the Kwara chapter of the National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS) not to move forward with any plans to halt flight operations at the Ilorin airport.

According to a statement released on Monday by police spokesman Ajayi Okasanmi, Mr. Odama met with student leaders to discuss the need to cancel the planned demonstration so that President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration and ASUU could resolve their differences amicably.

In support of ASUU, NANS had ordered all of its members to halt flight operations at all airports in the South-West zone, including the Ilorin International Airport.

The police commissioner, according to the statement, made it clear that he was always willing to work with the students and expected them to do the same.

In his warning that thugs might take over the demonstration, Mr. Odama cited the violence and property damage that followed the EndSARS protest in 2020. He also cautioned that closing the airport might have negative financial effects.

Suleiman Yusuf Issa, president of NANS, was quoted in the statement as promising to work with the Kwara police command.

According to the statement, “He informed the CP of the cooperation between the association and the state’s police and promised not to do anything that could jeopardize the amicable relationship and the tenuous peace existing in the state.”

“Issa explained that the directive to close the airports by NANS is only binding on the Zone D axis of the association,” the police statement continued, “whereas Kwara state is in Zone C, comprising states in North-Central axis.”

(NAN)