Issues
Addressing Animosities In Nigerian Varsities
I can say boldly that if the university system is exposed in its ramifications, it could be worse than the government we criticise – Prof. Timothy Awoniyi (Newswatch March 7, 1994).
The time has come when honest Nigerians, especially those well acquainted with the university system, must speak up so that the process of nation-cleansing can be a holistic rather than a one-sided affair. There was a time when a professor’s salary of less than N10,000 a month could rarely suffice to cater for his family during the month. That was a time when honest lecturers would shop in “Belgum” market for old dresses for themselves and their children. They were not ashamed to do so.
Then came a time when the “fight for salary structure” and improved conditions of service made the university system to be associated with strikes, “sorting” and other professional malpractices. That was a time when lecturers saw their former students, known to be leaders of cultists, become honourable national leaders and politicians. Then followed internal animosities, with fight for deanship and lobby for positions in government, dividing the academia to the extent that Ph.D degree became an acronym for “Pull him down” syndrome.
The growing rot in the university system came in tandem with growing devaluation of the nation’s currency – the Naira. Without going into the possible causes of the drastic devaluation of the Nigerian monetary system, one can say that its widespread effects forced many Nigerian lecturers to move out of the country for job satisfaction. The phenomenon of leaving Nigeria for countries with stable economy was not peculiar to university lecturers alone, because medical doctors and other professionals also did similar things.
It became increasingly glaring that Nigeria’s reward system had been grossly faulty for a long time. Between 1972 and 1982, the situation took shape gradually, characterized largely by the phenomenon of getting or grabbing what one can, without giving back anything of equivalent value. Productivity and integrity became rare qualities in Nigeria, as personal success was judged by myopic and measurable indices. Cult phenomenon became a common practise in universities, of which some highly placed people in the society where patrons.
One would not shy away from pointing fingers at the military for its role, among other malfeasance, of infecting the psyche of Nigerian youths with a culture of brashness and impunity. Politeness and courtesy became alien qualities among Nigerian youths. Let it be pointed out that a majority of the youths who were cultists and of crude temperament were largely children of the affluent class, especially children brought up in barracks. This assertion can hardly be dislodged effectively.
The university system, being a mirror-image of the society where it exists, would definitely reflect the wider culture and goings-on in the society. Therefore, there is no prank or trend in a society that cannot manifest in university campuses. It would be necessary to state that the introduction of the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) contributed in no small measure to put Nigerian universities in the condition that we find ourselves currently – a situation where people fake what they can’t make.
Whatever the justifications and reasons for the unification of admissions process in the university system, the abuses which that policy sought to eradicate, obviously became worse. When each university conducted its own admissions and screening processes, there was no way that some radical and die-hard people of integrity in the committee would all give into malpractices. It is doubtful if such robust process of checks and balances can feature in an impersonal body as JAMB, with electronic systems that can be manipulated.
Background of animosities in universities.
When it became a policy that professors would retire with their full salaries and other benefits, then came an era of rat race. Again it was made a condition that no lecturer without a Ph.D would become a professor; no matter how highly experienced. The result was that becoming a professor was characterised by fraud, chicanery, duplicity, etc.
While in world-class universities highly experienced and dedicated lecturers could become professors even with first degree certificates, in Nigeria a lorry-load of certificates would be needed for the purpose. The result of this trend is that world-class lecturers soon saw their former students become professors with less than eleven years of teaching and research experiences.
Coupled with this trend is the fact that close to seventy percent of the academic staff of Nigerian universities are either private consultants, business men and women, pastors or politicians. They often have the support and patronage of close friends in government, including former students who are highly placed in the public or private sectors of the economy. A situation where a lecturer who would hardly be in the lecture hall to teach his students, but always in the corridors in power, becomes a professor, his colleagues would soon throw dedication to duty to the wind.
It is quite human that nobody would want to slave himself to death for a system which does not reward diligent dedication to duty. What we find in Nigeria is that militancy, confrontation and noise-making attract attention, rather than follow slow, due process in a gentle way. Consequently, those who succeed in dealing with the establishment are those who resort to confrontation and crude ways of getting what they want.
Frankly, there are, among Nigerian university lecturers, the best that anyone can find anywhere else, with those longer in service having wider exposures and experiences. Unfortunately, there are also some in the system with the motive of making money fast, including some too with “Toronto certificates”. This would take us to the process of appointments and promotion of lecturers in the university system.
Appointments and Promotions in Universities.
The minimum requirement for appointment as an assistant lecturer in a university is Ph.D certificate, although some exceptionally brilliant candidates with less certificates can be employed as graduate assistants. There are some disciplines where expertise are rare, creating room for available candidates to be appointed. But there is a world of difference between a candidate having a certificate and the degree of diligent performance and personal character of the candidate.
For a number of years, the quality of diligence of Nigerian university students towards studies has been on the decline. Inspite of this phenomenon, there are students at all levels of university programmes who are exceptionally brilliant by nature. Since the Appointments and Promotions Committee in the university system hardly conducts aptitude or written tests for candidates, picking out the most brilliant candidates usually depends on oral performance during interview and the grade of certificate presented.
It is needful to remind the public also that the process of acquisition of university certificates is like anything else in Nigeria. The least that one can say is that a country which places higher reliance and value on certificates rather than practical competence, would encourage individuals to acquire fake and fraudulent certificates. Nigerians know ingenious ways of doing this.
One of the dangers we have in the Nigerian university system, which is also one of the causes of animosities therein, is the difficulty of differentiating the genuine from the fake. Especially in a situation where students who are the closest persons to lecturers and know the capability of each of them, do not make any input in lecturers’ assessments, promotions are bound to be faulty.
Animosities among the academia also arise from the peculiar politics of the university environment where ego, meanness, envy and pettiness predispose some staff towards using students to rubbish the reputation of their colleagues. Female lecturers and students are particularly handy tools in this game of calumny whereby accusations of sexual advances serve as the trump-card. Along with this malfeasance is the gossip connected with course allocations.
Roles of Vice-Chancellors
There are some university vice-chancellors who adopt divisive strategies as ready tools of administering the campus environment. Either they surround themselves with boot-lickers and table bearers, some factions of student-cultists, or members of their ethnic origin. This pattern is more common with VCs appointed from outside the regular staff of a university. It may be that being in a strong or new environment, the need for caution demands having to work with a clique that one can manipulate until one masters the environment properly.
The result has always been that the culture of collegiality gives way to paternalism and then to a possible witch-hunt of perceived or suspected rivals and “ill-disposed” staff. This phenomenon has been largely responsible for the estrangement, division and animosities in the university system, among various categories of staff. The situation is worse where some vice-chancellors delight in listening to gossips and operating a fascist system of administration.
Along with this divisive and fascist system of running a university system comes the issue of selective and unfair promotion of staff, where prejudices and animosities feature glaringly. When a university administration becomes a cult or political system, then bad faith and enmity are enthroned.
The purpose of this write- up is not to enumerate the woes besetting the university system in Nigeria, many of which are well known already to the public. Rather, apart from making a strong point that there has been a fall from the high pedestal of dignity to the abyss of disunity, there are animosities in the universities. Between the academic and non-academic staff there are animosities bordering on ego, salary structures and age of retirement, among other grouse.
Between the university administration and the entire campus community, all is not well, arising largely from legacies left behind by past university administrators. Student cultism thrives in such environment where battle for supremacy and patronage of the high and mighty play some role. Same division exists among students.
The most disturbing animosity is that which had been fostered among the academic staff, fuelled by various interest groups. To name such interest groups and the genesis of the trend may not be a polite thing to do. Let it suffice to say that promotion to professorship should be reviewed seriously, so that we do not continue to have “professor of Olularingology”, or “Quota professors”. Too many already!
Dr. Amirize is a retired lecturer at the Rivers State University, Port Harcourt.
By: Bright Amirize
This is an open letter to the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Chief Nyesom Wike.
Your Excellency,
Sir, ordinarily, I would not be writing an open letter to you, but like a wise man once said, “Silence would be Treason.” So I prefer to stay alive than face the consequences of silence in the face of crime. With each passing day, and as the socio-political tides continue to turn, it has become more pertinent that more people speak up in a concerted MANNER to prevent the death of our party, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), as we appear to be, in the words of W. B. Yeats, “turning and turning in the widening gyre” heading for an end where the falcon will no longer hear the falconer
It is unfortunate that since losing control of the Federal Government, with the loss of President Goodluck Jonathan at the poll in 2015, our party, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), has continued on a downward spiral. It is much more painful, that where it is expected that leaders within the party should rise to the challenge and put an end to this decline of our great party, some have instead taken up roles as its undertaker.
It will be hypocritical to claim aloofness to what I believe is your grouse with the PDP and I am not a hypocrite. It will be uncharitable on my part to discountenance the role you have played in strengthening the PDP from 2015 up until the last Presidential primaries of the party. It is my belief that your grouse against certain members of the party who you perceived worked against the party and abandoned it in 2015 and then came around much later to take control of the party, is justified. Also know that your decision to remain in the Party and stifle its progress on the other hand, as a sort of payback, stands condemned. For a man of your pedigree and stature, it is a dishonorable act, highly dishonorable and stands as testimony against all you claim to stand for.
At least, it can be argued that those who you hold this grudge against, abandoned the party completely and did not sit back while actively working to destroy it from within. But what then can be the argument on your own part, seeing that those you are currently working with against your party are the same people who set in motion, and executed surgically, the plans that not only ended our Party’s leadership at the centre, but ended up dislodging the first Niger Deltan to occupy Aso Rock as Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces. Is this not akin to “cutting off one’s nose to spite one’s face?” That will be worse than folly. Let us not throw away the baby with the bath water because we do not like the soap used in bathing the baby. It will be a grave mistake.
Honourable Minister, sir, it is rather unfortunate that of all people, you have also decided to play the role of an undertaker not only for our party, but for our dear Rivers State.
I will like to take you down memory lane a little. Let me remind you of your emergence as Guber candidate of the PDP in Rivers State, against all fairness and justice in 2014. You will remember that despite the reality being that you as an Ikwerre man was poised to replace a fellow Ikwerre man in Governor Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi in our multiethnic state, Rivers people overwhelmingly stood by you and pushed for your emergence as Executive Governor of Rivers State in 2015. I dare say that your popularity in the entire Niger Delta region was at an all-time high at this point.
I want you to understand why you were loved across board leading to your eventual emergence as Governor of Rivers State in 2015; it was because when it looked like all were against the second term ambitions of the first Niger Delta man to emerge as President of Nigeria, you became not just a pillar but a beacon of resistance by standing for Goodluck Jonathan. Rivers people, as grateful and rewarding as they can be, paid you back by ensuring your electoral victory against the incumbent All Progressives Congress (APC) led by your predecessor. On your emergence, where there were second term Governors in the region, you, a first term Governor, was seen by the people as not just the leader of the PDP, but the leader of the entire Niger Delta region. You earned it, and no one could dispute it.
In 2019, when your re-election bid was being challenged ferociously, Rivers people once again stood solidly behind you. Many were killed in the process of defending your votes. Do you remember Dr. Ferry Gberegbe that was shot and killed while trying to protect your votes in Khana Local Government Area? There are many more unnamed and unrecognised sons and daughters of Rivers State who sacrificed their lives so that you could emerge as a second term Governor of Rivers State.
In 2022/23, Honourable Minister, you oversaw a party primary across board that saw some candidates imprisoned and internal party democracy jettisoned for your wishes, leading to the emergence of flag bearers of our party all singlehandedly picked by you. You have on more than one occasion publicly stated that you paid for all their forms. Even those shortchanged in this process licked their wounds and continued to play their roles as party members to ensure the success of the party at all levels. In what will go down as one of the most keenly contested elections in recent Rivers history, with formidable candidates like Senator Magnus Abe of the Social Democratic Party (SDP), Mr Tonye Cole of the All Progressives Congress (APC), and the vibrant youth driven Labour Party (LP), PDP emerged victorious across board except for Phalga Constituency 1 that was lost to the Labour Party. (Not that you did not loose in some other LGA’s but let’s stick to the official figures declared by INEC).
It begs the question, why then do you want to burn down Rivers State, when everyone who now holds political office emerged through a process designed and endorsed by you? Is it that you do not care about Rivers people and you are all about yourself? If so, I am forced to believe that those around you are not telling you the truth. The truth being that in a state where your words were law; where houses and businesses could be demolished or closed down without any recourse to legalities, where Executive Orders could be deployed to stifle the opposition, that your popularity is now at an all-time low. Probably because they are afraid of you, or of losing the benefits they gain from you, they fail to tell you that what you might perceive as a battle against your successor, has slowly but gradually degenerating into a battle against Rivers State and Rivers people. You know, there is a popular saying that, a man can cook for the community and the community will finish the food, but when a community decides to cook for one man, the reverse is the case.
LEAVE FUBARA ALONE
You have gone on and on about being betrayed by Governor Siminalayi Fubara. You point fingers forgetting that some of those same fingers quick to spot betrayals point straight back at you. It is not Governor Fubara that has betrayed the PDP by working against it in the just concluded General Election, and working with the opposition at the State and Federal level to destabilise the party. It is you, Honourable Minister. It is not Governor Fubara that betrayed Rivers people by instigating a political crisis with propensity to escalate ethnic tensions in Rivers State. It is you Honourable Minister. It is not Governor Fubara that has declared himself God over all in Rivers State and has no qualms with burning the state to the ground to prove a point. It is you Honourable Minister. It is you Honourable Minister who told the world that the APC was a cancer and you can never support a cancerous party. It is you Honourable Minister who ended up facilitating the emergence of the same “cancerous” APC that has accelerated the economic decline of this country and further impoverished our people with no remorse. All so you can be a Minister of the Federal Capital Territory? The lack of self awareness is gobsmacking.
Some days back I came across a video where you talked about death and how you do not cry when you hear about the death of some people because you have no idea what might have caused it considering many a politician swear “over dead bodies” and still go back on their words. Those words made me think, and I could see the reason behind them. You see, in chosing to be God in the affairs of Rivers people, you have closed your eyes and ears to reason; you see nothing and hear nothing that can cause you to rethink on the path you have chosen. In your quest to “show Fubara” you have unwittingly united a vast majority of Rivers people behind him, so much that even those who despised him because of you, now like or love him, because of you too. In your scheming, I will advise you not to forget that “the voice of the people is the voice of God”.
Note that the war which you have or are waging against Governor Fubara, has gone beyond being merely political as you might see in your minds eye. It is now one that, fortunately for some and unfortunately for others, has evolved into a war against Rivers people. It is good to point out that no one has taken a stand against Rivers people and won. No one has gone against God and won. In your defiant characteristic manner, it will be unfortunate if you believe your own hubris and that of those around you on the possibility of you being the first to successfully go against Rivers people. It will be a needless gamble; one where if you win you create more enemies for yourself than you can withstand on your political journey, and if you lose, your legacy becomes an inglorious and irredeemable one in Rivers State, the Niger Delta, and Nigeria at large. For your sake as regards posterity, it is my greatest wish that you have a moment of sobriety and a deep reflection and introspection on this path you have chosen.
Honourable Minister, sir, what is left of your legacy is on the brink of being completely desecrated and relegated to the dustbin of our political history, and it will be a sad end to what I will say has been a wonderful political career that many can only dream of. The ball is in your court, and may God Almighty have mercy on us all and forgive us for our shortcomings.
Gabriel Baritulem Pidomson
Dr Pidomson is former Chief of Staff, Government House, Port Harcourt and former member, Rivers State House of Assembly.
In 2015, I made a conscious decision to invest my financial resources, my time, and energy into supporting Nyesom Wike’s gubernatorial campaign. I poured my heart and soul into ensuring Nyesom Wike emerged victorious even at the risk of my personal safety.
Again in 2019, I doubled down on my commitment. I invested a significant amount of money to procure campaign outfits for all twenty-three Local Governments Areas of Rivers State. I spared no expense in supplementing Wike’s election efforts in my own local government, and once again putting myself at great risk to safeguard the fairness and transparency of the electoral process.
However, despite my unwavering loyalty and sacrifices, I found myself abandoned and forgotten by Wike. Throughout his eight-year tenure, he failed to acknowledge my contributions or fulfill his promises and agreements. Even as a former Deputy Governor, Wike denied me my severance benefit.
My investment in Wike’s governorship was not just financial – it was a commitment of passion, dedication, and belief in a better future for Rivers State. Yet, his leadership style of dishonesty, greed, drunkenness and rash abuse of senior citizens brought me nothing but disappointment, misery and losses.
By the grace of God, today I speak not as a victim, but as a hero. I have accepted my losses, and I have moved on. And as I reflect on my experience, I cannot help but urge Wike to do the same and allow peace and development to reign in Rivers State.
Nyesom Wike, when you speak of investing in Governor Sim Fubara’s election, remember those like me who also invested in you. Remember the sacrifices I made, the risks I took, and the promises and agreements you left unfulfilled.
It is time for you, Wike, to let go of the past and allow Governor Sim Fubara the breathing space he needs to lead Rivers State forward. Allow him to focus on the challenges of good governance and the aspirations of the people. Spare him these unwarranted and ill-conceived political manoeuvrings founded on personal agenda and not for general good of Rivers State and her people.
I may have lost my investment on Wike, but I have not lost hope in the future of Rivers State. And together, we will continue to strive for a brighter tomorrow.
Long Live the Governor to Rivers State, Sir Siminialayi Fubara!
Long Live the Good People of Rivers State!!
Long Live the Federal Republic of Nigeria!!!
Engr Ikuru is former Deputy Governor of Rivers State.
Tele Ikuru
