Professor Nurudeen Adedipe: Exit of a mental giant (III)

ALMIGHTY Allah declares in the Holy Qur’an, Suratul Luqman, 31:34: “Indeed, Allah [alone] has knowledge of the Hour and sends down the rain and knows what is in the wombs. And no soul perceives what it will earn tomorrow, and no soul perceives in what land it will die. Indeed, Allah is Knowing and Acquainted.” (Quran, 31:34). To truly understand tawheed, the oneness of Allah, will be a lifelong journey – and this verse is a powerful reminder of how much at mercy of Allah we are. None of us can know when our time with death has come, and we must truly believe, accept, and embrace whatever Allah has planned for us.

In December 2003, Professor Nurudeen Adedipe and I resumed work at the IMA Research Centre in Abeokuta in full swing. Apart from my secretary, at IMA as the Secretary-General of IMA, he came with a secretary from the Federal University of Agriculture, Abeokuta (FUNAAB) to package the Academic Brief for the licence to establish the proposed Crescent University, Abeokuta.

Read Also: Equities market sustains bulls as investors earn N792.7bn

This was in the midst of the festivities when families were travelling in and out of the country for Christmas and New Year. And Judge Bola Ajibola, SAN, KBE, LL.D, then Nigeria’s High Commissioner to the United Kingdom in London, visited us thrice on the day as he was trying to travel to Senegal and Gambia with his family through Benin Republic on holidays.

But when he came the third time, Professor Adedipe told him that, “Your Excellency, your constant coming is a distraction for us please.” He declared, “We are here not because of you, but to serve God and humanity on this assignment gratis for posterity”. I shed tears as I write. May God grant Professor Nurudeen Adedipe Aljanna Firdous, Ameen.

Then Judge Abdul-Jabbar Bola Ajibola, SAN, apologised for causing distractions on his coming, explaining that he was feeling restrained from making the trip on holidays with his family to Senegal and Gambia through Benin Republic when we were there working assiduously for the realisation of his ambition. Thus, Professor Adedipe wished him and his family safe trip on the holidays.

Meanwhile, I raised the issue of my proposal for the Department of Mass Communication in a memo to Professor Adedipe, and recommended that the Dean of the Faculty Mass Communication of the Lagos State University, Professor Lai Oso, could help us package the syllabus of Mass Communication for the academic brief.

He approved immediately and asked me to go and call Professor Oso, who lived beside the IMA Research Centre where we were working. When Professor Oso came, Professor Adedipe jocularly and familiarly greeted him that we needed him to help us package the curriculum of Mass Communication for the proposed Crescent University, Abeokuta at gratis, as we were all getting the assignments done for posterity. More so, we didn’t have any Muslim university in Nigeria then.

Thus, Professor Oso accepted to do the assignment, and asked him to release me to him as secretary, and we would get it done in a week. Professor Adedipe readily agreed that I should join him to get the assignment done.

However, after five meetings with Professor Oso in his house, we got a unique curriculum of Mass Communications done. And we submitted in a week.

All the academic brief committees from the IMA Intellectual Submit had submitted reports for their departments and faculties, including Departments of Accounting; Business and Finance; Economics and Actuarial Sciences; Political Science and International Relations; General and Islamic Religious Studies; Mass Communications and Social Sciences and International Relations for the College of Social and Management Sciences (COSMAS).

Others are College of Information and Communication Technology with the Departments of Computer Science; Information Technology; College of Natural and Applied Sciences; and College of Environmental Sciences.

A unique feature of the Academic Brief of Crescent University, Abeokuta as recommended by the IMA Intellectual Submit is the Islamization of the Curriculum of the University, whereby every student up to the undergraduate and post-graduate programmes to undergo Arabic and Islamic studies during their diverse programmes.

This gives the graduates of Crescent University, Abeokuta, an edge over their counterparts from anywhere in the world as they have sound knowledge from Western and Islamic perspectives.

The compulsory Islamic programmes per semester in all courses included Philosophy of Islam I and II; Arabic for Beginners I and II; Islamic Banking; Zakat Accounting; Islamic Financial System and Institutions; Accounting for Islamic Banks; Introduction to Islamic Banking; Islamic Architecture, Samong others, reflecting in all the programmes at the university.

Almighty Allah declares in the Holy Qur’an, Al-Imran, 3:83-85: “Do they seek for other than the Religion of God? While all creatures in the heavens and on earth have willing or unwilling bowed to His Will (accepted Islam) and to Him shall they all be brought back.Say: “We believe in God and in what has been revealed to us and what was revealed to Abraham Isma`il Isaac Jacob and the Tribes and in (Books) given to Moses Jesus and the Prophets from their Lord; we make no distinction between one and another among them and to God do we bow our will (in Islam).” If anyone desires a religion other than Islam (submission to God) never, will it be accepted of him; and in the Hereafter he will be in the ranks of those who have lost (all spiritual good).”

However, we couldn’t start with the Faculty of Law at the Crescent University, Abeokuta, at the take-off in December 2005 when the NUC gave us the licence to operate, because of the glut of graduates of Law from across Nigeria that couldn’t get fixed in the Law School.

The NUC said we could only start the Law programme after two years of our take-off when the glut would have reduced. Judge Bola Ajibola, SAN, was pained by this development. He wondered how he could start a university without Law programme. The NUC explained the bad situation in the country. More so, Judge Ajibola, SAN,S trained his five children from his first marriage in Law up to Masters degrees and Ph.D., three men and two women and a SAN, and a lawyer from his second marriage.

In fact, Judge Bola Ajibola, SAN, always challenged me why I was not a lawyer. At a time, he asked me to go to London to get a degree in Law. But I told him that I couldn’t abandon my Ph.D. Communication and Media then at the University of Cairo, Egypt, in 2002.

Truly, Professor Nurudeen Olorun-Nimbe Adedipe was a world-class scholar who earned his Ph.D. at the age of 29 and became a professor at the age of 35. He was a well-rounded scholar, a professor of professors. May God Almighty comfort his family, particularly his wife, the pioneer Registrar of Crescent University, Abeokuta, Alhaja Silifat Olanrewaju Adedipe, Ameen.

May Almighty Allah rest the soul of Professor Nurudeen Adedipe for the great services to God and humanity, and grant him Aljanna Firdous, Ameen.

Almighty Allah declares in the Holy Qur’an, Al-Nahl, 16:61: “If God were to punish Men for their wrong-doing, He would not leave, on the (earth), A single living creature: But He gives them respite for a stated Term: When their Term expires, they would not be able to delay (the punishment) For a single hour, just as They would not be able To anticipate it (for a single hour).” Here again, we are reminded of our fate with death – none of us can change it. As much as we like to believe we are in control of our lives – even our health – we must submit to Allah’s will at all times and accept death as a blessing and a preordained end to our life here on earth.