‘The man dies in him, who keeps silent in the face of tyranny’

This was not the piece I intended to publish this week. The piece I prepared until Tuesday evening was a tribute to Professor James Adelabu, the worst Vice Chancellor any university in underdeveloped capitalist economy could have.I was motivated to parry that for another week to address this public letter to a man who many […]

This was not the piece I intended to publish this week. The piece I prepared until Tuesday evening was a tribute to Professor James Adelabu, the worst Vice Chancellor any university in underdeveloped capitalist economy could have.
I was motivated to parry that for another week to address this public letter to a man who many of his contemporaries and even juniors in the Nigerian military and politics have attested to as fair minded Nigerian whom I found late in his life and by the way he conducted the affairs of the council of the university of Abuja on Monday that led to the ‘election’ amongst unknown candidates that produced a ‘winner’ in spite of abstention by a strong minority members of the University Governing Council.
Your appointment as the Chairman of Governing Council of University of Abuja came to us with a lot of excitement having heard your name in public affairs since the late 1960s up to the late 70s when you returned as the Governor of the old Bendel State and later a minister of the federal republic.
As I said, I took time to consult with a few military officers who were your contemporaries and others junior to you and their conclusion on your personality was that you were a fantastic gentleman and fair minded. That was the word that some of them said of you. I did not expect otherwise even in the light of the longevity that God has blessed you with in a nation where the life expectancy was recently put at 49 years.
Since you came to the university, many stories followed as far as your chairmanship of the Board is concerned. I have always had hope that with people like you, the problems that are afflicting this country are likely to be overcome. I thought that having been so favored by God to live this long and in relative good health, you saw Nigeria through different times and you are one of the major beneficiaries of its gestures.
How would you allow yourself at the tail end be dragged in this mud of ethnicity and religious bigotry in a university which ordinarily is the ivory tower that shines on the rest of the society?
How did you allow religious bandits wearing the toga professorial camouflage lead you into doing what will continue to hunt you for the rest of your life and reverse a record which you took several years of hard work to build?
Dear General, I do not mind whoever emerges as the Vice Chancellor of the University of Abuja. Every member of the community, in the heat of the Professor Adelabu tragedy owned up and agreed that the community had made a mistake by rejecting the first two candidates during the selection and appointed him. The university community had a reason for that. The thinking that every time a VC was appointed, he was from outside the university so when he appeared a distant third in that selection, university members in council who outnumbered the external members thought it was an opportunity to keep a date with an earlier resolution.
He was subsequently elected but the reason was that he was from inside otherwise every other university appoints the best amongst the three that are shortlisted and forwarded to council. Adelabu’s reign as you know very well was a disaster and it will take the university several years to recover from the massive looting and fragmentation of all sub structures.
In the case of the troubled election you supervised in council on Monday, there are several issues that are compelling which you chose to ignore by succumbing to the pressure of religious bigotry. One is that amongst all the 10 candidates that were shortlisted from a list of 123 professors, non of them was from the University of Abuja meaning that they are all alien to the community.
The first three, i.e. Professors Dambatta, Lawal and Adikwu are all outsiders and therefore not known to the university community. The rationale of conducting any election amongst a set of people, the university community having no knowledge of possess more questions than answers.
In any case, the selection committee which was mandated by council to undertake the process as is the convention had met these people several times and came up with a final result. Is the selection committee’s integrity in doubt? What was the basis of election when three professors who are members of council were amongst the 123 applicants for the post of VC?
I would act the same way I m acting today if Professor Adikwu came first and he was substituted by either Professors Dambatta or Lawal. Injustice to one is injustice to all. What message are you sending to us younger elements who are desirous of seeing a free and egalitarian society exist in Nigeria?
Don’t you think those amongst you who are candidates were already unhappy with the process that threw them away even if they were clearly inferior and incapable? The system is unjustly shortchanged in the name of bigotry. I don’t know if there is any better term to qualify the situation that we saw on Monday and Tuesday.
Is it not a shame to report to Nigerians that professors under your leadership became pedestrian and behaved in a manner un professorial, un academic and in replica of what we see in broader Nigeria which more than anything is responsible for the endemic social unrest that we face as a people and backwardness in every facet of economic and political infrastructure?
The bottom line is justice. Since when has the meaning of justice changed to mean ‘personal comfort and convenience’. What you presided over was unfortunate and has dampened my zeal for a better Nigeria. What you presided over on Monday clearly was tyranny of the majority and an affront to merit in an ivory tower that ought to stand tall and shine upon the society.
What do you want the professors that came first and second to feel and believe about you, your council and Nigeria as a whole? Would you expect them to be patriotic Nigerians when merit was deliberately substituted with nepotism?
Let me ask you sir. Did you know any member of the council that purportedly voted for Professor Adikwu who knew him or the first two? No sir! You all don’t know the three of them even if you or any other member knew any or all of them, what you did has successfully dragged your hard earned reputation in the mud at least in my humble assessment.
How the voting did went? How manage that those who participated in the exercise all voted one way? For a candidate they did not know! Was there a level playing ground for others who vied for the post to meet and campaign to the council members? Many more very pertinent and disturbing questions arise in the entire process.
It is indeed saddening that a citadel of learning could be turned into a battle for religious supremacy. This has never happened before you came sir. How would allow selfishness becloud fundamental issues of propriety and orderliness? It’s sickening and I think under your leadership, things would take a completely different turn in the university of Abuja and this is unfortunate.
The saying of UsmanbnFodio readily comes to mind “a society can survive with unbelief but can never survive on injustice’ I am truly disappointed and feel betrayed by a council that ought to stand above board. The university is no longer the ivory tower that it is supposed to be. It is like any other garage or motor park since those whom Plato the philosopher referred to as kings have been dwarfed by sentiments and illogic. They are unfair and unjust.
I thought the university was the factory of ideas, in Abuja we have one that thrives in religious bigotry and hate. This cannot stand the test of time by His Grace. Its unchristian just as it is unIslamic to deploy injustice by virtue of position or any other advantage.