Graduates of Landmark University have accused the college management of failing to submit their names to the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) for mobilisation.

Many of them told FIJ that the college management failed to upload their names on the NYSC portal to punish them for not attending a programme that was held a day after their convocation ceremony in November 2021.

FIJ learnt that scores of Landmark University graduates did not attend the programme because they were either not aware of it or had left the school premises after their convocation ceremony.

Bisade Isiaka, a graduate of Landmark, told FIJ that the college’s decision not to submit their names to NYSC was unfair, as the programme was not made compulsory.

He said that many students were exhausted after their convocation and had gone home when they received an email that there was a meeting to attend the following day.

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“The convocation was on Friday. Everyone was stressed out,” Isiaka told FIJ. “The next thing to do was to rest and start clearance on Monday. But we got a message at night that we had a meeting with Bishop Oyedepo at 8 am the following day. Some people received the mail, others didn’t. Some were not even in school.”

Isiaka said when the clearance started, the Senate did not attend to people absent at the meeting. He said the Senate told him they were acting on the chancellor’s orders.

“The Senate attended to everyone three days later, saying the chancellor had forgiven us. Now, the school sent names of students to NYSC, but for us to find out, they did not send all the names of the recent graduates. Why? Because we didn’t attend the meeting with the chancellor,” Isiaka said.

Isiaka said many of the students who missed the programme were not at fault, as they received notification of the meeting late. He also said that unlike other meetings held in the school, the email did not mandate them to attend the TTG meeting.

He added that the Landmark University graduates who are currently serving are those who attended the programme and marked their attendance at the end of the programme.

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Bukola Oyebadejo, another graduate of Landmark University, said the management was unfair to its graduates. She said after the convocation ceremony, many people retired to nearby hotels and left for home the following day.

“The registrar arrived at the hostels at 9:30 a.m. on Saturday and summoned us to the chancellor’s meeting. I attended. But I could not thumbprint for attendance because my nails were long. I fixed long nails because I had to look good for my convocation,” Oyebadejo said.

She said she stayed on the college premises for another week to finish her clearance. According to Oyebadejo, when it was time to collect her notification of the result, the person to issue it said the chancellor had not asked him to give it out.

“After a while, they gave us our notification of the result. I thought that was the punishment for not attending the service, but they exempted us from it. All of us that did not attend the meeting are yet to be mobilised for service and the school has said nothing about this yet,” Oyebadejo said.

“We did not go with Batch A, and the next batch will soon go to the camp, yet the management has said nothing. We do not even know if they will mobilise us this year or not.”

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Funmilola Beckley, another graduate affected by the management decision, said the college did not state in the late email they sent that there would be grave consequences if they failed to attend either the convocation ceremony or the one after the convocation.

FIJ obtained a recorded phone conversation between a parent and Charity Aremu, the university registrar. The parent said he had mailed both the registrar and the college several times, but did not get any official response.

The parent told the registrar that he learnt that his ward’s failure to attend the TTG programme that was held a day after the convocation was the reason the management failed to mobilise them for service.

Responding, Aremu said: “They breached the rule. The rule is that they were to attend a chancellor’s meeting, and they did not. Some of them did not show up at the meeting. That NYSC, they will attend, but just be patient.”

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“The man of God said, ‘for God’s sake, after training you for four or five years and you cannot obey simple instructions, who tells me you will go out there and be a true ambassador?’ I assure you they will attend this NYSC.”

When FIJ called Charity Aremu, the registrar, to confirm if the students’ allegations were true, she said they were not.

“That is not true, sir. That cannot be true. It can never be true,” she said. “It is not information that is correct. I know the university is on top of this. For every system, there is always a guiding principle to run with, and that’s what we do as a university.”