Wither Nigerian varsity dons?

For instance, the National Universities Commission (NUC) had previously arrested fake professors who made claims of what they never professed. Daily Trust carried a story on page 8 of its Friday September 26, 2014 edition in which the NUC Executive Secretary Professor Julius Okojie announced the nabbing of a fake Professor recently at the Commission’s […]

For instance, the National Universities Commission (NUC) had previously arrested fake professors who made claims of what they never professed. Daily Trust carried a story on page 8 of its Friday September 26, 2014 edition in which the NUC Executive Secretary Professor Julius Okojie announced the nabbing of a fake Professor recently at the Commission’s premises in Abuja. But why wouldn’t there exist fake professors when academics who should be busy in their libraries, research rooms and laboratories are busy chasing money from north to south and west to east; abandoning their statutory duties of teaching, research and community service?
In the past, some scholars suffered ulcer because of the prolonged hours they spent reading, writing and researching without eating at the appropriate time. Not many of today’s academics who ask for professorial chairs are as passionate as their foremost teachers, mentors or supervisors about contributing to knowledge in a very original and brilliant way. Their priorities today instead include owning and driving the most expensive cars; building and living in the tallest edifices or fabulously furnished mansions; etc. Some dons are actually liabilities to the system as they neither publish even one journal paper or a research finding in two years!
If fake professors exist, it is also possible to have fake PhD holders within and outside the system. Nigerian universities are encouraged to borrow a leaf from the Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida University (IBBU) in Lapai Niger State where there exists no room for fake professors or PhD holders. The IBBUL has a continuous certificate verification exercise by which all claims of academic qualifications however so low or high are verified. IBBUL once discovered a fake professor through the process and dismissed him from the institution just as several others guilty of false certificate claims (due largely to undue desperation) had their appointments terminated.
Worse than faking academic qualifications among varsity dons is sexual harassment. An Ahmadu Bello University (ABU) Zaria don was recently caught at a private female hostel in Samaru, Zaria. The story which was reported on page 9 of Daily Trust edition of Wednesday September 17, 2014 revealed that the accused lecturer disguised by wearing hijab (veil) and attempted to sneak in to the hostel but was caught.
It could also be recalled that a professor at ABU Zaria was in June 2013 sentenced by a Chief Magistrate Court in Kiyawa Local Government Area of Jigawa state to two months imprisonment without an option of fine for knowingly enticing a married woman who was his student. The accused don who pleaded guilty to sending love text messages to the married woman was caught red handed with her by the police in a hotel room.
Corruption is another evil that is devastating the university system in contemporary Nigeria. During a sensitization seminar on “Effects of Corruption on the Nigerian University System” jointly organized by the NUC and the Independent Corrupt Practices and other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) in July 2012, the NUC Executive Secretary Professor Julius Okojie remarked that “Corruption in Nigerian Universities became pervasive when the position of Vice Chancellor (VC) became a political appointment. Once cannot agree more with Okojie that political VCs have corrupted the system.
Political VCs identify lecturers who do not deserve to be in the system owing to weak intellectual capacity or similar factors, and then appoint them to positions of responsibility. Such sycophantic lecturers are thus manipulated by political VCs to suit their self-centered motives. Many of today’s Nigerian university dons are guilty of nearly all the evils which they valiantly condemned others outside the intellectual community for. The accusing fingers which custodians of Nigeria’s ivory towers pointed at politicians and political office holders, civil servants, the judiciary; police, customs, and contractors today point back straight and directly at themselves.
The crises in many Nigerian Universities today revolve around flagrant abuse of processes in student admissions, irregularities in the appointment and promotion of staff, manipulation and falsification of academic records, sales of examination scores by lecturers, syndicated plagiarism, violation of project administration and procurement laws, bastardization of accreditation guidelines, running of un-approved academic programmes and study centres, and utter neglect of infrastructural development. Because of system failure, some vice chancellors turned themselves in to admission officers doing the job of academic secretaries.
Some VCs even descend so low as to get involved in allocation of hostel allocation to students and other flimsy issues to the detriment of matters that are critical to the development and survival of the system such as accreditation of courses, convening and presiding over senate meetings regularly, staff promotion, monitoring adherence to examination ethics, and periodic reports on research activities of lectures. The “donation” of honorary degrees to very undeserving recipients is one form of corruption that has reduced such degrees to the level of traditional or ceremonial titles.
These inexcusable challenges have had their consequences on the system and on the nation. The University of Ilorin, for instance, which was recently ranked as the best among Nigerian universities occupies the 20th position among African universities. A recent study by the Time Higher Education’s World University Rankings shows that no Nigerian university made the top 400 in the world. The three universities that made the list in Africa are South African institutions.
If no nation can rise above the quality of its teachers, it could thus be implied that no nation can rise beyond the quality of the system that produces teachers for all fields of knowledge. Government must undertake a comprehensive system study of universities to identify and correct corruption-prone processes. To fix the rot in the system, there is need for an “Educational and Academic Crimes Commission (EACC)” headed by a credible academic to deal with the unfortunate challenges currently bedeviling the Nigerian university system. May Allah (SWT) guide our varsity dons to be what they ought to be to the society, amin.

Ali Muzrui dies:
I condole with the global intellectual community over the death of this great scholar. May Allah grant him mercy, amin.