The present council under your leadership was inaugurated in May 2017. Two years down the lane, how has the experience been so far?
I would say so far, so good. Federal University, Minna is a university members of the governing council are all happy and proud to be with. It is a university that has a national and cosmopolitan composition. We have a country with so many ethnic groups, 36 states, 774 local governments. So, it is a good thing if a university is not local in terms of its staff and students composition. The university has that national character in terms of its staff and students’ composition, and there is no visible crack along the usual major fault lines of the country because most issues in the country are interpreted in terms of ethnicity and religion. And if you look at the relationship between the staff and students and between the staff unions and management, there appears to be appreciable industrial harmony and you could see that during my tenure, we have been able to appoint a new vice chancellor, and a new registrar. In most universities, there are usually problems when you have to appoint a new vice chancellor and a new registrar but we have been able to do it and everybody seems to be happy with the exercise.
Also, during our tenure, Professor Emmanuel Emeka Udensi was appointed as DVC (Administration) and there was renewal of appointment of Professor Yahaya Ahmed Iyaka as DVC (Academics). We also have the award of the Africa Centre of Excellence on Mycotoxin and Foods Safety grants to the tune of about $4 million and numerous other grants from TETFund, from the National Communications Commission, from the Ministry of Mines and Steel, etc. What I’m trying to say in summary is that what we have done in my tenure is to add to the brand of the university, particularly in the areas of integrity and in the area of good governance and the efforts to subdue corruption and corrupt tendencies.
During the inauguration of this present council, the Minister of Education, Mallam Adamu Adamu, urged councils of federal universities to live above board and to use their contacts in the society to attract funds as well as projects to their various universities. To what extent has the council under your watch been able to achieve this?
Members of council are Nigerians and, of course, they would have people they know in and outside of government. To that extent, they are supposed to use their relationship to benefit the university. I’m able to say that this council has been instrumental to the university accessing N2.5 billion Needs Assessment Fund, which was previously held up in the Ministry of Finance. We have also been instrumental in the award of N3 billion Special High Impact Fund from TETFund. We have been instrumental in getting donation of sports equipment by Chief Steve Akigha. We have been instrumental in encouraging possible collaborations with security agencies like the National Intelligence Agency, to see how they could help with the Cyber Security Science Department. And I can assure you that we will continue to do more.
This council is not nosy; we know the jurisdiction of council and we don’t try to interfere in the work of management. I go around the campus maybe once a year. We look at the facilities, because my argument is that the university exists to service students; so, if students are not satisfied, we are not doing our work. So, I want to see the situation of the classrooms, lecture theaters, hostels, and clinics.
Do you agree that there is a disconnect between universities and industries in Nigeria? If yes, how can this gap be bridged for the benefit of both parties and society at large?
I think there is disconnect, but it is not a complete disconnect and there is room for improvement. Take for example, here there is collaboration between FUT, Minna and the military; there is collaboration between FUT, Minna and the Nigerian Communications Commission; there is collaboration between FUT, Minna and Nigerian Communications Satellite Limited, and so on. So, I would say here there is disconnect but efforts are being made. Industries do not believe they could get a lot from our universities. Again, you relate it to the issue of funding; if there is no money to fund research for development, what will the industry be doing relating to the universities except to donate a building to them and donate a professorial chair? But you find industries in a place like the United Kingdom devoting millions to a particular problem or project, and that one can go on for five or 10 years before it materializes. On the other hand, (Nigeria’s) capitalist position is quick returns; your industries want quick return. Industries in western societies can be investing for years in a particular project without seeing the light of it, but they will keep at it until they succeed. Local industries here want quick returns; foreign industries that come in also want quick returns to make their money and go.
As a member of the Presidential Advisory Committee Against Corruption, how do you think the issue of corruption can be tackled in Nigerian tertiary institutions?
It has been on now for decades and particularly from the mid-1980s, corruption entered the university system. There are all kinds of corrupt practices in the university system. There is the money, there is the admission racket, there is sex or money for grades, there is corruption in promotion system, whether academic or non-academic. You find all kinds of corruption. It is not just financial and it is particularly dangerous in the academic system, just like it is dangerous in the police and in the judiciary. It is dangerous to the survival of the society when corruption eats into the educational system. Somebody once said that if you want to destroy a country, corrupt its educational system. That means you produce doctors who cannot operate, who will give injection at the wrong place; you will produce engineers who will produce collapsed buildings; you will have politicians who will be dishonest. What we should do is to insist on due process in terms of financial and other transactions. There should be transparency; whether you are admission officer, recruitment officer, procurement officer or lecturer giving marks, you must ensure that there is transparency and that there should be integrity in discharging your responsibilities. We in the council, we told the university that immediately there is any matter of academic corruption or sexual corruption, they should bring it up and immediately you find the person guilty, terminate (his/her appointment) and make posters of the staff; maybe about 200 posters at strategic places. It will have effect on people who want to commit such criminalities.
One could say you are a strong advocate of social justice or equity, and this is consistent with the statement you have made in public concerning the wide gap between the salaries of workers at the bottom rung of the ladder and those at the top. How do we tackle this?
In this country, there is a wide gap between the haves and the have-nots, and the consequence is what we are having now as insecurity. For us to get over this, put in place socio-economic policies that will close this gap and make the dividends of development more evenly available –that is preparing against 25, 30 years from now. This problem you are having now didn’t start yesterday; it started from the disparities that had been intensifying for the past 30 years, and it became worse from the mid-1980s when the Structural Adjustment Programme started. Since that time, we have been going down the drain in terms of this widening of the gap between the haves and the have-nots.
This kind of inequality and legalized corruption must be dealt with. If we deal with them, we are reducing the problem for the future.