By Prof. Abdelghaffar Amoka
A Hausa interview by a professor from ABU, lamenting academics’ poor pay, is trending and has re-ignited the debate on the salaries of Nigerian academics on social media. The discussion is championed by my brothers from the region, which is considered by the country as educationally less developed. I didn’t know what to say that I hadn’t said before. It will be like repeating myself.
Professors in Nigeria are now blamed for their financial status. They are expected to stop lamenting and get a side hustle to augment their salaries. A professor whose salary was ₦450,000 in 2009, when the exchange rate was ₦140 per dollar, is blamed for his economic state in 2025, with a salary of about ₦500,000, when the exchange rate is ₦1,600 per dollar.
Some people are referring to professors abroad as if some of us have not had the experience. A number of us have studied and worked there, and we know how their university system works. I got two grants in the UK during my PhD. They said a professor earns more abroad from their research grants. The primary beneficiaries of research grants are postgraduate students and postdoctoral researchers. Professors are not paid from their grants.
Grants have a budget, and personnel costs are not included. They are paid to the university account and managed by the university. The university pays professors to encourage them to think critically and attract grants for the institution. A university lecturer around the world is paid enough to give him the comfort to think and do his job as it should. Any extra cash from stuff like consultancy is for additional comfort.
The Executive Secretary of TETfund, Sunny Echono, in July 2024, said: “On salary to lecturer, I feel ashamed because I have the privilege to represent Nigeria at a global conference where former presidents and prime ministers were in attendance. I was asked if it was true that a professor, after 20 years, still earns less than $1,000 a month. I couldn’t answer that question; I only said that we are doing something about it.” I think we should be proud of the salaries of our professors and boldly tell anyone around the world their actual salaries.
Before you, in your narrow-minded state, blame professors for their financial status, ask yourself why the Nigerian government will pay the same professors about two thousand dollars per month under the Technical Aid Corp (TAC) to go help teach in universities in some African countries? The same professors who are given approximately $ 2,000 to teach in Ugandan universities under TAC are receiving an equivalent of $ 320 per month at home.
You know what? Everyone is right—those for and against. The argument won’t change anything, and it will likely end within a day or two. The new reality is that younger academics have learned from the impact of senior colleagues’ commitment to the academic job. The commitment you considered as “our stupidity”. The younger academics are planning for themselves.
A colleague, after the 8-month strike and the withholding of our 8-month salaries, said the university does not deserve his full-time commitment. That he is going to give the university the time it deserves and use a large chunk of his time for a side hustle to pay his bills, I thought, was unreasonable. I later realised I was the unreasonable one. And he is not doing badly from the side hustle.
Around this time last year, I was passing and met some of my students in the class without the lecturer. In my usual chat with the students, I asked whose lecture it was. I decided to call a younger colleague, as students were waiting for his class in case he forgot. He picked up the call and said he had forgotten he had a class, but that he was on his farm planting, and that he would see them next week. He was at the farm during work hours and forgot he had a class because the farming hustle is paying the bills. He is actually doing quite well with his side hustle.
Farming during work hours becomes more important. I reflected on that for several days. There are several examples of young academics who won’t be seen on campus, except when they have a lecture or are on campus for something they consider essential.
People sometimes question why a whole professor would accept being an adviser or assistant to a political office holder. A trip with the political officeholder boss could get him his one-year gross salary as a professor. Since it’s his fault that he is poor, why shouldn’t he accept such an offer or even lobby for it?
As a consequence of defeat, we have accepted one awkward thing as a part of us. Because we can’t do anything about our tormentors and needed someone to blame, we blamed ourselves, the victims. It’s our fault that we’ve been on the same salary for 16 years, from 2009 to date. It’s our fault that successive governments refused to renegotiate the 2009 agreed salary with ASUU. It is our fault that the government of President Tinubu has kept Yayale Ahmed’s 2009 Renegotiation Committee report since November 2024 without speaking about it. They are still studying it, possibly till May 2027 or beyond.
Universities are designed to attract the best minds from around the world. Universities, including those in Africa, such as those in Ethiopia, Uganda, Kenya, and Chad, are attracting the best brains. At the same time, we justify the poor pay for academics and still blame them for their inability to compete with their colleagues in the UK, the US, and Iran. We’ll continue to breed our best brains for these countries.
Meanwhile, as we take all the blame for our economic status as professors, younger academics are devising ways to survive. They don’t want to he like their senior colleagues who bury themselves in their books thinking they are serving the country. They are given more time for their side hustle to pay the bills, and leave the students hanging. They’ll attend to them when we can. The system will bear the consequences of neglect, and our survival plans will be affected.
From a reality check, you can’t think when you are hungry. So, what are your expectations when your thinkers are hungry and you are unfortunately justifying it? We may be on a journey of illusion if you expect a man to look for food to eat and think for you. The future will tell who gains and who loses.
Best wishes to all of us!
©Amoka