Abdelghaffar Amoka Abdelmalik, PhD.
The major newspapers published the speech delivered by the president at the “Fourth National Summit on Diminishing Corruption in the Public Sector” on the 4th of October 2022. In the speech, the president said, “corruption in the education system from basic level to the tertiary level has been undermining our investment in the sector, and those who go on prolonged strikes on flimsy reasons are no less complicit.” The Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU, is the union on strike, so the newspapers reported it with headlines that “Buhari accuses ASUU of corruption”.
The president definitely does not have a thorough understanding of the issues that led to the strike else he won’t call the struggle for the proper funding of the universities, better conditions of service for lecturers, the release of the white paper on the visitation panel reports, among other important demands as “flimsy reasons”. It is sad and most unpardonable that the president has got no proper information on the structure and workings of the university. Otherwise, he would have queried that ridiculous and false statement when the speechwriter presented the speech to him for presentation. So unbelievable that our president is not aware that ASUU is not the same as the university management.
To correct this unfortunate misinformation from the president, in the university, there are heads of departments who are academics who receive N50,000 every 3 months for operational expenses. We have the Deans and Directors who are also academics which is the next level of leadership in the university. The Directorates receive N60,000 every 3 months for operational expenses. Is the misappropriation of these N20,000 per month, which comes irregularly that is corruption by ASUU members?
Then, we have the principal officers, which include the Vice-Chancellor (an academic), the Registrar (a non-academic), and the Bursar (a non-academic). There is also the Council chaired by an appointee of the government. You can’t appoint politicians looking for jobs as University Council chairs and blame ASUU for corruption. ASUU is just a union and does not manage the affairs of the university. Then, there is the Presidential visitation panel that is meant to visit the university every 5 years to check the management of the resources of the university.
It’s true that the management of the university could be corrupt. There is no doubt about it. But since the administration of President Buhari took over in 2015, the “corruption fighting” president seems to have found accommodation with corruption in the university that it failed to send a visitation panel to any federal university. ASUU was worried about that, and part of the demands of the 2020 ASUU strike was the constitution of the visitation panel to all federal universities. Paradoxically, it took the strike by the union of supposed “corrupt lecturers” for the anti-corruption FG to send visitation panels to the federal universities in 2021 to check “corruption”.
However, a year after the panels submitted their reports, the same FG that is accusing ASUU of corruption has refused to release the White Paper on the panels’ reports for implementation. Part of the demands of this strike is for FG to release the White Papers. The “corrupt ASUU” is pushing the anti-corrupt government to fight corruption in the university. Isn’t that amazing? It goes without saying by its inaction, indifference, and condemnable refusal to set up visitation panels and release the White Papers after ASUU forced it to set up visitation panels to all federal universities, the FG under President Buhari is aiding corruption in our universities.
Meanwhile, you can’t be complaining of corruption but rewarding alleged corrupt people. The former VC of the Michael Okpara University of Agriculture, that was accused of academic fraud, financial embezzlement, and administrative impunity by the ASUU branch of the university, made the list of the people to be awarded a national honour by the president. Same with the former Council Chairman of the Lagos State University, who, with the VC, deployed the pension of Staff for the purchase of luxurious cars.
Does it make sense to accuse the university managers of corruption and then nominate university managers that were accused of corruption for national honours without taking steps to investigate these allegations? That’s a joke. By the way, what is the correlation between the poverty wages of Nigerian academics with corruption in the universities? Does that explain why Nigerian lecturers are one of the poorest paid in the world?
The president further said that he task our academics to attract endowments, research, and other grants to universities, polytechnics, and colleges of education similar to what obtains in other countries. It has been rightly said that “if wishes are horses, beggars too will ride”. It does not take rocket science to know how those universities referenced achieved that. An endowment is not attracted by academics but by the university council and management. President Buhari should stop his trademark and uninspiring blame game and should be talking to the people he appointed as Council chairmen for our public universities.
The truth is, research grants are not attractive using an empty room as a lab. No international donor will fund empty space. Only the existence of avalanches and modern facilities are used to attract grants. When I got a PhD grant in 2008, I took the grant to a university in the UK because they have the required facilities for the research. For the 3 years, the UK university got thousands of pounds through me. That’s a return on investment. What have we put in place to attract such? That’s what we should be worried about. That’s why ASUU is asking for the required funds to be injected into the system to make our universities attractive for grants, as it’s obtained in other countries.
Despite the horrible condition of service of academics in the country, Nigerian academics are winning research grants. An Associate professor at Bayero University Kano recently received a research grant of £969,680 from Wellcome. A senior lecturer at Ahmadu Bello University Zaria recently won a research grant of about 48,000 USD from Geophysics Without Borders. Other researchers from the Federal University Dutse won a grant of $59,930 from The World Academy of Science (TWAS) and €220,801 from the African Academy of Science on renewable energy. These are just a few of the grants won by academics within the strike period.
The president’s speech was focused on ASUU, and the speechwriter chose his words with the utmost malice and mischief. There are sex scandals in every sector of the country. The rehash and blackmail of sex stories in the universities have become much like an expired drug with no potency. The stories of sex for jobs and contracts and sorting jobs and contracts in Abuja are in public space. Every sector has got the good, the bad, and the ugly. So, academia can’t be immune to the ills in our society.
But then, universities are still much better. They have rules and regulations that guide their operations, and they are enforced. Several lecturers have lost their jobs due to sex scandals or other similar offences. But we have a minister in this government that was accused of sexual harassment in 2020. If a student is a victim of such an act on campus and he or she refuses to report for appropriate actions to be taken, then you can’t blame ASUU for it.
Our Union frowns on sexual harassment in all its ramifications in our universities and is up in arms combating this evil. Hence, this speech which is similar to the words of their filthy-mouthed attack dog and other government agents at the presidency at this time, is an indication that it is either the people around the president are not telling him the truth about the strike or the depth of the poverty of sincerity is underestimated.
It is equally indicative that the administration has run out of ideas and initiatives to resolve a simple issue like the ongoing strike action. The Speaker of the House of Representatives, in an effort to bring an end to the 7-month-old crisis, has met with the president. Let’s hope that those agents of destruction around the president will allow him to think.
What baffled me is the fact that the Visitor to the university is publicly lamenting when he has not taken any action for 7 years to address all his allegations against the University. You are the president, sir. Please use your executive powers to solve problems, not passing bucks. Dear sir, you lament everything from the economy to insecurity to education, but lamentations won’t solve our problems. You need to be proactive, sir. You are the president; time is almost running out. Better late than never.
Finally, despite the way that academics in Nigerian public universities are handled, our research outputs are visible in the global research database. If political office holders should make one-tenth of the efforts and sacrifices made by academics in our public universities, they will be celebrated as heroes in office.
Professor Abdelghaffar Amoka Abdelmalik wrote from Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria.
Awesome piece, Prof. More ink to your mighty pen.