There has been an uproar on social media and among students of the Federal Polytechnic, Ilaro, Ogun State, over the death of Adejoke Ajayi, a leisure and tourism department student.

FIJ learned that Ajayi, an HND 1 student, died on Wednesday moments after she complained of abdominal pains and was rushed to the clinic.

Although some students alleged that she died due to negligence and delay at the school clinic because she did not have her clinic card, the school claimed this was not the case.

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A student told FIJ that Ajayi was taking a practical examination when she complained of stomach ache that Wednesday. She would be rushed to the school clinic, where medical professionals failed to attend to her because of her inability to produce her clinic pass.

“The practical is even for a borrowed course and it required her to cook. She was partnered with a female student. As they were both cooking, Ajayi started complaining of stomach ache. She was shivering, and her cooking partner took her somewhere to sit in the hope that she would be fine,” the student source revealed.

“Not long after, the cooking partner checked on her again and found Ajayi’s body had changed. She had become white [pale]. She was shaking and was almost stiff. She could not even stand up. The lecturers there tried to stretch her fingers because they were gradually getting stiff. When they saw that it did nothing to help her situation, the cooking partner quickly headed to the school clinic with Ajayi.

“When they got there, they asked for her clinic card. To be honest, the school has always told us to put clinic passes inside our ID cards. But this girl did not have a clinic pass yet. She was in HND 1, and it seems she was yet to do all the registration required for a clinic pass. But as the school clinic is located inside the school, wasn’t it the clinic’s duty to attend to her, whether she had a pass or not? They were supposed to attend to people, but they failed to attend to her.

“Somewhere along the line, the girl called her boyfriend. He came to meet them at the school clinic and she was taken to a private hospital close to the school. It was at the private hospital that they detected that she was pregnant.

“Till she died, the lady did not know that she was pregnant. At the hospital, they made efforts to save her. She was placed on oxygen and they ran some tests on her. They also did some scans on her, through which they found that she was pregnant. I learned that the girl’s parents are very old. And she had been trying to get pregnant since her ND days because she had fibroid.”

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FIJ’s source at the school also drew attention to the lack of freedom of speech and limited ability to protest at their school.

“In this school, we don’t have freedom of speech. We can’t even protest or fight certain things happening here. The school is now claiming that she had an abortion. They pasted the memo yesterday [Wednesday] night. Even if this were to be true, should the school clinic not have attended to her immediately?” She asked.

A medical report from the school’s director of medical services stated:

“Due to the nature of her case being an emergency, she was quickly attended to without requesting her clinic card as she was brought to the ward and assisted by the security guard on duty. One of our doctors quickly attended to her while vital signs (blood pressure and pulse) were taken by the nurses. Examination revealed a lady who was very pale (from loss of blood), unrecordable blood pressure and a pregnancy test was positive. A possible diagnosis of ectopic pregnancy (pregnancy outside the womb) to rule out criminal abortion was made. She was quickly taken in the school ambulance with one of our nurses and her boyfriend to the closest private clinic where an urgent abdominal scan was carried out on her. Her parents were duly informed through her boyfriend and asked them to come to llaro. The scan revealed that she was pregnant and the baby in her womb was already dead possibly from abortion to terminate the pregnancy. She was admitted at the private clinic but her condition deteriorated beyond all medical interventions administered on her. She later gave up the ghost as all efforts to resuscitate her failed.”

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A statement from the school’s public relations office also revealed that her death was a result of pregnancy-related complications and not negligence by the clinic.

Meanwhile, another source told FIJ that several deaths of students have been recorded at the Federal Polytechnic in the current semester.

“I have seen posts about different deaths of students, but I don’t really know the total number of cases recorded,” said the source.

Abimbola Abatta is a reporter with FIJ, writing reports in partnership with Report for the World, which matches local newsrooms with talented emerging journalists to report on under-covered issues around the globe.