Nigerian varsities are intellectually lazy —Aregbesola

The governor of Osun State, Mr Rauf Aregbesola, has described the situation where operators of Universities in Nigeria rely on subvention from the owners and burden students with exorbitant tuition fees as intellectual laziness.

The Governor observed this at the formal opening of the access road to the Osun State University (UNIOSUN), constructed with a donation and the university’s internally generated funds.

He said that Nigerian universities should adopt world best practices where schools raise funds through endowments, grants and donations from the larger society, which is the primary beneficiary of university education.

The Chancellor of UNIOSUN, Chief Mrs Folorunso Alakija assisted the university with N250 million, which was the exact amount needed to complete the road project.

The Chairman Governing Council  and Pro-Chancellor of the university, Mallam Yusuf Ali, also commended the donor, Mrs Alakija, for being passionate about the plight of the institution.

He disclosed that the university only paid N100 million out of the N350 million spent for the construction of the access road.

Aregbesola averred that university funding anywhere in the world is capital intensive and requires help from philanthropists like Mrs Alakija to boost education system.

He commended Mrs Alakija’s gesture, saying it is a refreshing perspective on funding for education, particularly the university, which requires a huge financial outlay.

Aregbesola said: “Universities require a large amount for capital projects and not less sum for recurrent expenditure.

“In our intellectually lazy (or idea challenged) environment, the line of least resistance has largely been followed – which is to rely on subvention from the owners and burden the students with humongous tuition fees.

“But the best practices, as we see from other climes, are to raise funds through endowments, grants and donations from the larger society, which is the primary beneficiary of university education anyway.

“Universities also generate revenues through patents, royalties and other intellectual property materials.

“This is why there is a huge gap between per capita spending on students by the Euro-American universities, compared to our own.”

The governor commended UNIOSUN for being on this same path of operating within the framework of intenational standard of running a tertiary institution.

He stated that the university has been self-subsisting as his government stopped giving any subvention to it.

He added that universities all over the country must wake up to the economic realities of the present time and be creative in sourcing funds to run their institutions.

He continued: “This university has been responsible for generating its own revenue, even when we asked it to review tuition fees downward.

“I am therefore commending Dr Alakija for her kind gesture in helping the university to construct this road and for her other interventions in the institution.”

In her remarks, the donor, Mrs Alakija, attributed the gesture towards the construction of the university’s access road to her immeasurable passion for education.

She lamented on deplorable state of the nation’s education system, saying it is lamentable and disheartening that no Nigerian University made the list of the first 1000 universities in the world.

“Education is a vision my family and I do not take lightly. This is evidenced by the support we continue to give to students through our Rose of Sharon Foundation where almost 1,500 students benefit from our scholarship program up to university level and the same spirit which also drove the completion of this project,” she said.

In his welcome address, the Vice Chancellor of the University, Professor Labode Popoola, applauded the philanthropic gestures of the donor, Dr. (Mrs) Folorunso Alakija, describing her as a seasoned philanthropist.

According to him: “One of my first major activities on assumption of duty was a meeting to renegotiate the contract for the construction of this road. I bless the day, 22 March, 2017 when I led my Management Team to our Chancellor, Dr. (Mrs) Folorunso Alakija, in her Lagos Office as part of the preparation towards the 6th Convocation of our University.

“In my briefing, I lamented the state of the access road to our university and the challenge to raise the sum of N250 million to complete the road project

“But three days after the visit, we received the alert for the sum of two hundred and fifty million naira from the school chancellor and for this reason, the chancellor deserves our accolade.”

“She is always there for us, her unparalleled benevolence for the completion of this road project is highly commendable. Her unending passion to positively impact humanity is an inspiration for us as an institution.”