Examine This Case...Any Legal Merit?

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"We must examine the past to fix the present and plan the future" Anonymous.

PROLOGUE.
I have been advised to bring legal action against a high school for injures inflicted on me. Such physical and psychological injuries have left telling and lasting consequences in form of deep wounds and huge scars. Please examine the case and render your opinion.

A PEEP INTO HISTORY.
Government College, Ikorodu...my Alma mata...
My memories of this high school is bitter-sweeet...tending to vaccilate between the bitterness of being unprotected from unmitigated bullying....to otherwise fond memories....

I vividly recall that day in September of 1974 when on arrival at the temporary site of the school on Old Agbowa Road...now Obafemi Awolowo Way....in the sleepy community which doubles as my home town...

Our arrival was personally registered by our pionner principal, Mr Olatunde Balogun. Later, we had "agidi" and "moinmoin" for supper...with the good old Chief Adeniran Ogunsanya, the state commissioner for education in attendance! We were the pioneers...

THE BULLYING...
I recall that notwithstanding the fact that I was unarguably the most bullied student in my time, none of my bullies was ever punished. The teachers chose to be selectively blind to my oft -bursted lips, swollen face or bruised body...even when they observed these infractions.

Our principal had this nephew in our school whose impressive build mirrors that of a gorilla. He was the son of the Akarigbo of Ijebu Igbo. He was my junior. He beat me up for "insulting" him. I reported him to Mr Principal who somehow ruled that I "must" have been at fault. The principal never arraigned the boy in the assembly hall. And we never saw him go on suspension! And when my mum came a visiting and saw me with a swollen face after receiving a punch from another boy and she complained to the warden, Mr Principal's wife who taught English Literature summoned me to scold me for my mother's complaints! The boy had promised during class hours to beat me up. So, he kept his promise by simply visiting my room, dragging me out and hitting me!

The only remarkable feature in my physique was my huge head. Placed atop a skinny body and spiny legs, you would wonder how I could possibly beat up anybody...but this school somehow got me suspended for "beating up" a classmate! I suppose my tormentors found it hard to tolerate a skinny boy who spoke back at them...as my peers merely put it all down to "a Tosin who was always fighting!"

My teachers had their good sides...
STILL, MY PRINCIPAL.
Usually, my principal on receipt of reports would arraign the culprit on the school rostrum and give him a thousand and one reasons why he "would" end up as a failure in life! He seldom investigated cases. That was not his style. He lacked consistency...

At a stage, I mustered up enough courage to write him a protest note after he suspended me in absentia! The thrust of my letter was that even law courts endeavour to hear out both sides before passing judgement. After going through my petition, he simply smiled, jokingly called me "oloyinbo repete" and dropped the case! That was the first time my pen would rise up in stout defense of my skinny physique! Mr Balogun also had his good sides...

"DOUBLE RATION".
I recall pranks like "double ration" which the school authorities tended to view with more seriousness than students....a mischief for which I was invariably caught whenever I risked the venture! I felt the need to so do to tide over for my next meal whenever such was beans soup which caused me to vomit.

You see, my revulsion for boiled beans was an open secret. My mother informed the Principal on "day-one" of this fact but he advised her to tell the Chief Cook. My mother took me directly to her to apprise her of that fact... The Chief Cook promptly nicknamed me "Majewa"....(meaning "one who doesn't eat beans"). This alias stuck to me like glue for the entirety of my high school years. So, my aversion for boiled beans was not in doubt. But the Chief Cook consistently gave me Garri to soak and eat...as a "favour"! Perhaps the school authorities should have provided me a better alternative.... I sought recompense for meals not served through "double ration"....a wrong approach! Well...at COMMON LAW. A vast number of students played such pranks. Most escaped uncaught. I always got caught. My tremors in the act a ready give-away!

LEGAL IMPLICATIONS...
But clearly, the school failed yet again to care for one of its own in provision of meals...in the same manner it failed to protect him from bullying!

My aversion for boiled beans was well known to the Chief Cook and Matron who were high ranking officers of the school...yet they in their wisdom, felt Garri was the best alternative they could offer! Yet, they were elated at "catching me in the act" and reporting to the Principal. My gaunt and malnourished physique was due to starvation... among other reasons.

A responsible school would not abandon his ward to hunger if he cannot eat specific meals for reasons bordering on aversion, allergy, duodenal ulcers, heart diseases or other health considerations...or simply leave him to fend for himself in such foreign lands!

When a student pays his fees, there comes into immediate existence a CONTRACT between him and his school to render services for which such fees were received...otherwise such school stands guilty of a breach of contract!

There is also the element of a breach of TRUST. Parents submit to boarding schools their kids trusting that such kids would be cared for. When such student, merely in his early teens, is in such boarding house far away from his parents and his home, it is expected that his school lives up to its billing as a responsible guardian by treating him humanely.

House masters are like proxy or foster parents. They are the only parents the pupil knows in school. So, this school also failed in matters of DUE DILIGENCE.

Such offenses are criminal in nature and not statute barred! I have resisted the urge to lodge a formal complaint against that school and its ertswhile officials for CRIMINAL NEGLIGENCE. For its crimes against me are no less telling than lasting. Its actions and inactions left me with huge wounds hard of healing and scars too grotesque to ignore.

Our life EXPERIENCES shape and colour our personality. They are like scripts written in indelible ink. The evolved adult is a product of his experiences during growth!

Persons inflicted with less psychological trauma than mine end up being unduly forceful, combative and aggressive. They find it hard to trust others and form lasting relationships. I also struggle with some of these consequences.... Added to the physical INJURIES, their combined effect was...and is, harrowing....

This school also erred at EQUITY to which it came with soiled hands by punishing a vulnerable, starved and shortchanged ward for "double ration"!

AN OVER-ADJUSTMENT?
Perhaps these painful experiences have led me to over-adjust and say "never again"! To bullying! To public shame!

I have taken the shame of those days seriously... perhaps too seriously. I have refused to cheat, to lie, to steal, to offer or receive bribes, to blend with a bad system and perverted societal values!

I have taken the admonitions of Mr Balogun to heart... perhaps too seriously!

My decision to read medicine has not "helped" matters. The humanistic requirements of my professional calling...added to a life of bullying and severe punishment for nearly all infractions for which others escaped uncaught...must have contributed to my current mindset. I just don't have the luck to escape punishment for offenses...an odd mindset that somehow propels me to be truthful always, be honest always, to be unbending always...in my adult years!

People often tell me that my ways are odd and unrealistic...when they are kind with words. They call me eccentric in their foul moods and mad when really exasperated by my choices which are definitely at variance with the strange ways, norms, values and mindset of the Nigerian society!

My "odd" mindset has informed the essence and thrust of my writings...about rogues in government...outside of government... even rogue beliefs and inhuman adherence to wicked cultural traditions like slaughtering of humans to appease native "gods"! My sentiments are even extended to animals...which I advocate for to be killed painlessly...as I floated the group Animal Rights Advocates..

For those writings, I have no apologies!
RETURN OF THE BULLIES.
I write on some bigoted attitudes and a former classmate pounces on me with gutter language even though such articles are not personally directed at him....as he self-appoints himself as a custodian of his clan.

I write another article not personally directed at another former classmate....and he also resorts to foul words as a self-appointed custodian of Yoruba traditions....to be jealously protected at all cost....even if human beheadings must be retained! So, I followed up with an article citing him in exactitude!

Yet another former classmate intrudes to take sides...rather than settle the rift....also spewing gutter language and lurid manners.

And so the bullying continues...
Obviously, my former bullies have not mended their ways... It seems as if these fellows now intend to do with harsh words what they can no longer do with kicks and blows...but I am now hypersensitive to bullying!

AVOIDANCE OF ALUMNI ACTIVITIES.
From the foregoing, it is clear that my aversion for alumni activities of this school is out of deep resentment arising from unpalatable memories...not pride or arrogance as touted in some quarters. Such memories are reinforced by the unhealed wounds and huge scars I incurred. The eagerness of some former classmates to repeat the bullying for filmsy excuses can only reopen wounds struggling to heal. If I am truly mad, Government College Ikorodu largely contributed to that madness!

CONCLUSION.
The cited incidences are true. Correspondences to me from the school are documents which I have saved with utmost care. The school may revert to free legal counsel by its alumni if it is incapable of paying a lawyer...

That I am a doctor does not preclude me to injuries... or feelings...

Or rights...
Dr Tosin Akindele is a medical practitioner and public affairs analyst.

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Articles by Tosin Akindele