EX-VC/ASUU Chair, Prof. Yakubu, Throws Bombshell
- Faults Naming Of Varsities After Politicians
- Calls ASUU’S Strike Method ‘Outdated Madness’
- Describes Yola Elders’ NASS Memo On FUT As ‘Stupidity’
- Says 15m Out Of School Children May Join ‘Boko Haram’
- Opines That Nigeria’s Democracy Is A ‘Conceived Dictatorship’
- Advocates Expansion, Introduction Of New Courses In Varsities
By Pauline Abutu & Muhammad A. Dalhat
The Former Vice Chancellor of University of Abuja, Professor Nuhu Yaqub has slammed and faulted Visitors, Council and Management of Nigerian Universities for politicizing the naming of universities against the International convention on global best practice.
“Apart from Nigeria, where universities and other institutions of higher learning are named after politicians who are not known for not contributing anything to education, but have fought against its development in many ways, all major and leading universities in the world are named after the cities where they are located,” he stressed.
Professor Yaqub who stated this while speaking recently at the 3rd Combined Convocation lecture of Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida University Lapai, as the Convocation Lecturer on a topic “Globalization and its Challenges to the Management, Survival and Relevance of the Nigerian University Education System.”
The former Vice Chancellor who boasted that as a former Chairman of Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), Usmanu Dan Fodio University Sokoto Branch, he had never been on the same page with the union on its traditional strike option, which he described as “outdated madness,” as the only method and best option to put pressure on government to address its demands.
He adviced Union to, as intellectuals, abandon the old fashioned strike method and come up with better ways of fighting for their rights that, will not at the end of the day, affect the quality of education that the students are supposed to receive, or have the period of their graduation elongated incessantly.
He suggested that the union should try the option of lobby by hiring the services of highly influential people in the society to lobby and persuade the government to look into their demands with the view of addressing them.
The erudite Professor, who raised so many controversial issues in the lecture also picked holes in a memo Elders of Yola in Adamawa State wrote to the National Assembly requesting it to approve the conversion of Modibbo Adama University of Technology, Yola to a Conventional University.
The Professor who described the request as “stupidity” reminded the elders that what they have in that university is “priceless,” stressing that any community that has such an institution in this age should consider itself lucky because everything in the world today is technology driven.
“In view of the importance of Technology today in the daily lives of people, and development of Nations, it wont be out of place if all Polytechnics and Universities in the country can all be converted to Universities of Technology” he opined.
Professor Yaqub who called on both the federal and state governments to declare state of emergency in the education sector, to address the plight of the over 15 million out of school children aimlessly roaming the streets of Nigeria, majority of who are in the northern part of the country.
He said leaving these vulnerable children without education is counterproductive to the nation because they at the risk of becoming potential Boko Haram members or army.
The scholar who expressed disappointment on the undemocratic attitudes of Nigerian leaders, especially their flagrant disrespect of all democratic values and principles regretted that since the so called and over 20 years of Nigeria’s return to democracy the country had never had leaders that are genuinely and patriotically committed to basic democratic values, principles and systems of governance.
Professor Yaqub therefore opined that what is practiced by our leaders in Nigeria today is not and can never be called democracy, but can best be described as ‘Conceived Dictatorship’.
The professor who said giving the yearly surge in the number of University Seeking Candidates in the country, government must properly fund the universities by allocating 30% of its annual budget to education to help the Universities expansd by acquiring more facilities and infrastructure to accommodate our teeming youths that are in search of university education, “proper funding of the education sector will also enable the universities to introduce new courses to accommodate more students”, he stressed.