Chairman of the Independent Corrupt Practices and other related offences Commission (ICPC), Prof. Bolaji Owasanoye, has cautioned students in higher institutions against inducing their lecturers sexually to pass their examinations.
Owasanoye, who gave the warning during the inauguration of Students Anti-Corruption Vanguard (SAV) in Abuja yesterday, said that any student, who engages in such immoral behaviour, would be investigated and prosecuted by the commission when reported.
The ICPC boss, represented by the commission’s Head of Education Department, Baba Ashiru, said: “We are aware some of you induce the teachers also. If you leverage on that and pass your examinations, and it is reported to the commission, we will investigate and when you are found guilty, you will be prosecuted.”
According to Owasanoye, the commission was engaging the youths actively in the fight against corruption to eradicate sexual harassment, sexual inducement, cultism, examination malpractices as well as truancy, adding that any nation that neglects the youths does so at its own peril.
He told participants that they must be men and women of integrity as they were the backbone and strength of the nation and should play a huge role in moving the nation forward.
Owasanoye said that the commission, since its inception, had always recognised the vital role youths play in the anti-corruption fight, and had seen the need to ensure their participation in the memorable event, as well as for them to seize the opportunity to sensitise their peers and members of the public against the menace.
In another development, Ekiti State Governor Kayode Fayemi yesterday said that the state government would soon issue a blanket guideline that will curb illegal collection of fees in public schools across the state, insisting that education remains free in the state’s public schools.
The governor, who stated this at a meeting with key stakeholders in the education sector, said he had received series of complaints that students were still being charged despite the executive order made by him last December abolishing payment of education levies in the state.
Fayemi, who reiterated that the revocation of education fees was not a political gimmick, said the government would no longer tolerate any head teacher or principal who sends pupils out of schools on account of fees.
However, the state’s President of the All Nigeria Conference of Principals of Secondary Schools, Mr. Abiodun Omotoso, said parents do not understand the provisions of the executive order, urging the governor to specify which fees the government had cancelled.He denied collusion between principals and some executives of PTA on alleged extortion of students through illegal collection of fees.
