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ASUU AND THE PROBLEMS IN OUR UNIVERSITIES By Whatever position one holds on the ongoing impasse in the industrial tussle between ASUU and the FGN, there is an incontrovertible middle ground on which all should agree and that is the fact that the future well-being of Nigeria as a modern prosperous and peaceful society depends largely on how seriously we take the educational development of the youths of today. We are unduly postponing the day our nation’s electricity and water supply would work without interruption; communication system functions easily, predictably and cheaply; able to cure those simple diseases currently ravaging us and also qualified to be counted amongst the decent comity of nations, by unnecessarily closing our universities. This singular realism should serve as a compelling moderating factor in the seemly mad pursuit of the various narrow and apparently unbridgeable interests that have come to play in the inevitable process of resolving the differences separating the feuding parties.
The sad reality confronting us now is that learning as a social and a developmental process has virtually halted all across the nation’s public universities - a phenomenon that has led to the unjustifiable frustration of the yearnings of thousands of our youths for quality education, the unending distress of parents and guardians, the embarrassment of the academia as being insensitive to the cries and yearning of both the students and their parents, not to talk of the bad image it has given the government as being uncaring and insensitive to the gaping decay in the educational sector. Again, from whichever angle one looks at the problems, the longer the strike lasts, the weaker the legitimacy of the positions of all the parties involved become with the likely result that, if reason is not permitted the early chance to reign, we may all end up the losers with the nation’s future as the greatest victim.
There is no telling the fact that ASUU had good reasons to embark on the industrial action that it took, especially as it relates to the vexed question of the contemptuous under-funding of the educational sector all across the board with that of the universities being the most appalling. Also, on the list of demands by the body is the rectification of the gross inhumanity involved in the mass termination of apparently non-complaint staff at the University of Ilorin. Why such a local crisis should be allowed to drag on up till this time is one wonder that is so difficult to fathom within the larger complexities of the crises we face in the higher education affairs of the country.
The union, rightly, could not look the other way while some of its members were being unfairly humiliated because, someday, it could be the turn of those yet to be affected. But it does not however seem balanced on logic that just to achieve redress in Ilorin that the whole university system would have to be shut down. There must be more productive and less disruptive ways of redressing that industrial problem aside of the conventional strike actions that have been adopted over the years because if and when those Ilorin colleagues are ultimately reinstated, we would still have to confront the lingering problems of a school system that was unduly dislocated and the cost/benefit calculus may ultimately see us all as net losers.
Perhaps the most fundamental of the reasons why ASUU downed tools is the poor funding records of the government for higher education. This has been an ongoing problem, which reached its nadir in the dark anti-intellectual days of the military. In many respects, the present administration has shown greater commitment to the long-term problems of our universities than all the previous ones combined, at least, on paper and in declarations. I am certainly not talking about the new pay system which, in practical terms, is merely an exercise in tokenism as it still does not adequately redress the continuous official gross pauperisation and unfair demonisation of the nation’s academia. But the fact that it is no longer a crime to profess or indulge in intellectual discourse in the country as was the case with the previous undemocratic military regimes gives some of us something to hope for while also conceding the point that an empty stomach or a harassed personality is not likely to sustain a fertile mind such as expected of our teachers.
Things ought to be better for the university system in a constitutional democracy than as they are presented today. It is really regrettable that we are still dealing with the debilitating phenomena of strikes by university dons while students are still coping with the endless anxiety about what their academic programs would be and whether they are in for a trap within the university endless circle of crises or that they could ever dream of graduating someday in the face of the incessant disruptions. It should be the concern of all stakeholders within the system that the nation’s university degrees are getting to be questioned by the consuming public as to their quality. One sure way to worsen the already bad situation is to make it seem as if our universities only open for studies when they are on ‘holiday’ from their perpetual closures.
It is in the light of this frightening reality that I urge that both ASUU and the government must make some determined and honest concessions in the interest of the nation. There was the rumour that the seemly endless stand-off was merely contrived by some vested interests, to keep the schools under lock and keys for the period of the 2003 elections. While it is difficult to see the sense in such outlandish claims, it is equally difficult to understand why it is proving so difficult for the otherwise educated parties that are locked in the ongoing negotiations to promptly resolve the matter judiciously and allow learning to resume in our schools.
One example is the reluctance on the part of the government to unconditionally reinstate those staff who are still willing to resume their lawful duties at Ilorin, more so, as there does not seem to be a valid justification for their ouster in the first place, beyond the elements of personal ego and empire-building instincts of some university administrators. It is therefore difficult to see why the government has opted for a round about way to resolving the problem by asking those Ilorin staff to pick up appointments at universities other than Ilorin from where they were initially sacked. The rationale for that offer is difficult to fathom. Why would they be forcibly dispersed to other institutions when in fact we are talking about reinstatement to the status quo ante? Heavens will certainly not fall if they are reinstated with immediate effect to Ilorin and have back their former positions. It is just possible that, someone, somewhere, for his own selfish reasons is misleading the government from acting decisively over the matter. If the government could go as far as asking the concerned staff to take up comparable jobs in any federally owned university, it remains a poser why they are now personae non grata at Ilorin from where they were initially dismissed.
As for funding, it is obvious that there is not much that the government can do over that immediately. All that is needed is a demonstrable commitment to a decent funding level as honestly as possible. In all probability, ASUU should be willing to appreciate the reality of the fiscal status of the government but it is difficult to push this point further whenever the evidence is adduced to the fact that the government has indeed reduced on the percentage it allocates to the educational sector as against some other not-so-crucial sectors purely for political or other arcane reasons and the utter official wastes and profligacy that assault our sensibilities daily.
An emergency situation already clearly exists on our campuses and it is only a deliberate massive infusion of considerable resources and a careful monitoring of such inflow of resources that would make some minimal impact. I think it is time that the nation rises up to face the reality of higher education in the scheme of things. Hauling undeserved insults at each other across the feuding trenches does not help matters. What is required is a very serious diagnosis of the ailment within the system by all that truly love it. One first point to note here is that the era of free education is regrettably at an end in Nigeria. I concede that public universities would continue to be based on official subsidy but they must begin to supplement their budgetary allocation with fees and other necessary charges; education, for it to be qualitative at this age, must be at a cost in which the students, parents and private sector much pick their fair share of the bill. It is obvious that government alone cannot afford it anymore.
The second point by way of a poser is: must the universities be made desolate first before these remedial steps take place? The answer to us should be no. We do not need to first destroy the campuses, wholesale, before repairing them. We can certainly minimise on the waste and decay that they are undergoing right now by doing all we can to preserve the essential values of the system, i.e., teaching and research, while battling for the restoration of the integrity of the system that has seen very bad times. But that cannot happen by keeping the campuses under locks and keys. It was fashionable in the anti-intellectual days of the military to use the incessant closure of schools as a punitive measure. The military vandals could do that without any qualms but a constitutional democracy cannot afford such debilitating anti-intellectual steps. The practice of locking up our schools just to make an industrial or a proprietary point should now be seen for what it is: otiose, anachronistic and wholly counter-productive.
The un-quantifiable sacrifice of the Nigerian academia is already well known. The ill informed lampooning that often comes its way from individuals who never matriculated or had good fortune to have stayed in an academic domus must stop. It is really a national tragedy that people would find it funny doling out undeserved insults on their intellectual superiors as is presently the case in Nigeria. The concept of the Ivy League, for example, exists simply to foster excellence and pay tribute to quality scholarship in the US. Not so in Nigeria where money and brute power is the basis of respect and recognition. ASUU should therefore rise beyond the limitations of our politicians and go back to classes. The better judgement for now is not to be seen to be joining forces with those who do not wish the nation well by unwittingly undermining the school system and the nation’s social order.
The private universities that are springing up in the country may be helpful to the manpower supply of the nation as well as the fulfilment of certain parochial objectives of the investors but it must be stressed that what we presently have as private universities are not founded on the same enlightened philosophy that informed the evolution of private universities elsewhere as those Nigerian entrepreneurs who are now rushing to investing in them only see them as an alternative and, perhaps more profitable venture, to the business of buying and selling - a commercial disposition that is a complete corruption of the motivation for private intervention in university education. The glorious private universities that dominate English and American academic landscape were set up to foster the ideals of free speech and intellectual freedom and by so doing expand on the frontiers of knowledge and NOT to make quick profits as is the primary motive with those that are now springing up in Nigeria. That is why the public universities would remain the centres of intellectual excellence in the country for a very long time while the private universities would remain basically an economic proposition devoid of serious scholastic motivations.
It is however pertinent to note here that Nigerian public universities are currently harbouring some misfits within their belly; there are those who call themselves teachers but, who due to their intellectual and ethical weaknesses, ought never to be associated with the ivory tower. But they are there, filling out ethnic and 'indigeneship' quotas and fomenting troubles and holding the real scholars within the system to ransom. It is no exaggeration to classify some of them as not educated enough to work therein. Yet they hold positions on our campuses that are well beyond their capacities. A few of them starkly do not know much about the traditional obligation of rigorous intellectual research and pontification on the problems of their environment. Instead of proffering workable solutions and propounding superior alternatives through scholarly researches, dissent and related activities, they have become enamoured with superstition, ethnic jingoists, crass materialism, ideological fixation, excessive religiosity and general intellectual degeneration. The unchecked activities of these few sub-standard and evidently counterfeit intellectuals is making it possible for the majority of hard-working and brilliant members of the system to suffer a general and indiscriminate disrespect from the public, nay, the government.
In many respects, this parlous state of affairs could be traced to the uncoordinated proliferation of universities within such a short period of time, especially by ill-prepared and wretched state governments, for purely political and ego boosting reasons. To make matters worse, this period also coincided with that when it was becoming extremely difficult to recruit new hands into the faculties and those that showed up were not always of the standards previously required. What is more, due to the declining level of learning in our schools, junior recruits into the academia could no longer be trusted to be able to carry out the burden of scholarship. Even those who wanted to go back to school for higher degrees were lured into non-academic programs like he ubiquitous market-oriented all-comers MBA other similar courses instead of pursuing truly academic programs that are designed to deepen the intellectual foundations of the students.
Even the few that could pass the muster of academic recruitment were unable to stabilise in the system as there were no longer able and quality mentoring that normally come from the senior faculty members whose rank diminished rapidly as many of the very best hands were forced out by a combination of many factors including lack of material satisfaction from the job, official humiliation of the intellectual class and the rabid competition from the private sector. In some desperate cases, just anybody with a degree was hired to teach even if that person does not possess the requisite flair and intellectual ability for a productive career in the academia. That is why today we have ‘professors’ that cannot profess and a few others who enjoy appending so many dubious titles after their names but cannot conceptualise the most elementary of ideas. That, indeed, are those of them who still bothered to think and write at all. Many have apparently forgotten where their pens are! Yet they continue to decorate themselves with endless citations and oversized regalia of obsolete and undeserved academic titles.
On the other hand, we have as students, kids who, for all intents and purposes, are not university materials but who are being indiscriminately imposed on the faculties at the direction of the political elite (previously military) who see the universities as another patronage disbursing machine. Such unmeritorious intakes are naturally not to be expected to keep to the demanding university tradition of learning, character moulding and ethics. They would rather be cult members, armed robbers and examination cheats than do well in their studies and eventually emerge as refined individuals.
So we have the unpleasant combination of bad teachers teaching equally bad students - a veritable recipe for an academic disaster. To be taken seriously, ASUU must therefore address this problem. There are people who parade themselves as belonging to the system who definitely have no business with a university, properly so-called. It is high time that ASUU sorted itself out and remove the shaft frown the grains. This internal self-cleaning must be carried out to its logical conclusion if the campuses are to see any sustainable revival. A situation where people who call themselves ‘dons’ (or dunces?) are making an industry out of massive copyrights violation by way of handouts sales to unsuspecting students at exorbitant prices while the students themselves are just too happy to do less schooling, does not augur well for the future of the country. Therefore, the universities must cure themselves of these problems of low quality faculty and lowly motivated students as well as the culture of charlatans in academic gowns while it battle it out with the government for better funding as no amount of money would turn an incompetent teacher into an award-winning scholar.
Let no one be mistaken, Nigerian universities still have a pool of dedicated and internationally respected scholars who are ever toiling, day in and day out, pushing the frontiers of knowledge as far as human ingenuity can go. I have been privileged to go round a bit and worked under different systems and under varying conditions. One fact which has strongly registered in me and which cannot be glibly disputed is that if the Nigerian academia were to get just a fraction of what his counterparts elsewhere gets for research and teaching, the sky would have been his limits and I am very proud of what many have done within the acuity of the scarcity on Nigerian campuses. It remains, for example, a generational puzzle why Nigerian universities are not yet on the web, a situation that has effectively shut them out of the ever-expanding information highway - thereby imposing a very thick intellectual eclipse on those who ought to be the light-bearers of the nation.
It is the hope that we promptly overcome some of the problems that have just been highlighted so that we can have back some of our scholars now needlessly sojourning in foreign lands, helping to further develop these societies that are already well off while their own country is reeling in intellectual degeneration as no nation can rise beyond the limits of her universities. The technological dimension of the current war between the US and the Iraqi regime should give us good reasons to put our universities in order as no one will transfer any technology to us. We have to develop ours by using our best brains within. I have pointed elsewhere that we may wake up tomorrow to find out that our quarrelling neighbour, Cameroon, is already a nuclear power while we, the big-for-nothing nation, would still be debating when to re-open our universities. It is both a strategic and a developmental irresponsibility, if not madness, for us to be toying with our higher education system the way we do presently.
It is therefore important that we all recognise that it is good time to go for a truce and braze up for the greater and inevitable battle that historically confronts our people of which the academia naturally constitutes the real vanguard. Today, no one can doubt the patriotism and the nationalistic zeal that have animated the actions so far taken by the Dipo Fashina-led union. But the time we are in right now is not exactly auspicious for the methods currently being applied because not all that is possible is probable, a point which the NLC leadership aptly demonstrated recently by shelving a planned national strike action. Let the campuses re-open now! April 2003
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