Buhari's aide challenges Nigerian universities on problem-solving research

Senior Special Assistant to President Buhari on UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), Princess Adejoke Orelope-Adefulire, on Tuesday, in Lagos, challenged Nigerian universities to bring forward research projects that are capable to solve major societal problems, saying her office is much ready to fund some of them.

She gave the task at the 2022 Research and Innovation Fair organised by the Lagos State University(LASU) Ojo, at its main campus.

According to her, there are many challenges confronting Nigeria and its people, universities should be able to rise and take up the task of solving them and with LASU taking the lead.

Orelope-Adefulire, a former deputy governor of Lagos State, was the keynote speaker at the event.

Speaking on the theme of the fair, “Repositioning the Nigerian university system for global relevance and competitiveness in learning, research, innovation and technological transfer,” she said research and innovations are the best investment to build a healthy and sustainable society that will shape national and global prosperity of any country.

She commended LASU for organising the annual fair with this year’s edition fourth in the series, saying the theme is in line with the spirit and intent of some SDGs, particularly that of 4 which targets inclusive and equitable quality education and promotion of lifelong learning opportunities for all and the one that concerns about innovations, partnership and knowledge transfer between and among countries.

According to her, qualitative and inclusive education is a crucial tool for achieving sustainable livelihood and economic prosperity for families and societies and universities play significant roles in this regard.

“This is because the role of universities is very important to all sectors of human endeavours, from social, economic, environmental, legal to all others,” she stressed.

Orelope-Adefulire, who said her office’s target is to train up to 1.2 million youths on various skills and also move a significant number of out-of-school children off the streets to classrooms, maintained that Nigeria truly needs to reposition its universities.

She said without credible research and innovations with universities taking the lead, for example, it would almost be impossible for Nigeria to move forward appreciably.

She said apart from that her office is ready to support research activities, particularly from LASU, she announced building a 750- capacity seater hall personally for LASU as part of her own contributions to the university.

In his own presentation, the guest speaker and former Vice-Chancellor of the University of Ibadan, Prof Olufemi Bamiro, also emphasised the need for both the university students and lecturers either as an individual or groups to scale up engagements in cutting-edge research projects that will substantially impact the society.

He said it is absolutely unnecessary again for Nigerians to continue to complain of challenges or dwell on them but rather to begin to look all out for practical solutions that will take Nigeria out of poor countries.

He said the reality on ground now is that the world has moved to knowledge and technology-based economy where certificate acquisition is no longer an in-thing in any field but what one can bring to the table in form of contributions to solve societal problems.

He said information and communication technology (ICT) has brought about that great revolution in all facets of human endeavours across fields and that it is important for Nigeria’s academic communities to play crucial roles in this regard.

While asking the government at the centre and state level to put universities to task in providing solutions to specific societal problems, he said universities on their part should collaborate with government and the industries to produce high-quality manpower and also impactful multi-disciplinary research and community services.

He said without meaningful research and innovations particularly as the world is moving towards the fourth industrial revolution where artificial intelligence will take over substantial economic activities, it will be difficult for Nigeria to move forward appreciably.

He, however, commended LASU for sustaining the research fair instituted four years ago, urging it to intensify the effort as the benefits will be unquantifiable in the near future.

Speaking earlier, the Vice-Chancellor of LASU, Prof Ibiyemi Olatunji-Bello, who decried poor global ranking of Nigerian universities, said the situation has really called for an urgent need to reposition them.

She said even though many challenges such as poor infrastructural facilities and funding, brain drain, recurrent industrial actions, shortage of learning, teaching and research facilities, among others could be linked to the poor ranking, programmes such as research and innovation fairs just like the one being organised by LASU can help Nigerian universities to optimally perform their tripartite roles of teaching, research and community services.

She said LASU has taken the issue of research and innovation very seriously such that it instituted N5million research grants for cutting-edge research for researchers in the system and also in the process of securing intellectual property on outcomes for them.

She said she hope that the actionable blueprints that the participants will come up with at the end of the fair will propel action toward Nigeria attaining global economic relevance.

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