Professor Hilary Inyang is the founding Chair and distinguished Professor of the Global Institute for Sustainable Development Advance Analysis and Design, which is based in the United States with Liaison Office in Abuja Nigeria. A former vice chancellor/president of the African University of Science and Technology (AUST), Abuja and also the Botswana International University of Science and Technology, he is in Nigeria to perform some analysis in the area of Education, Science Technology and Innovation. He served for some time as the Chair of the Steering Committee of African Science Plans. He speaks in this interview with CLEMENT IDOKO on the reasons Nigeria is still crawling at 64, state of education in the country, among other issues. EXCERPTS:
YOU have an impressive background in Technology, Environment and Engineering. What was your motivation growing up?
I came into educational relevance during the 1960s in primary school. 1960s to late 70s was the time that there were significant advances in science and technology. The US had just gone to the Moon, the Apollo era and the Soviet Union then had circumnavigated many planets and were deep in space and many things came, television and many other things. Those things were all products of Science as I recognized it. So, my interest in science was very deep because there were fundamental things that I always wondered about, the stars, the universe. In my geography lessons, I learnt about them and my interest was wetted. I wanted to know more about them and I read about the great Scientists, Einstein, and many of them. Therefore, I sought education in that knowledge sector to find out more about them.
What has Nigeria not gotten right in education when you want to compare the kind of education you received back in 1960 and now?
Well, in terms of structure, let me give kudos to Nigeria; they have done well; primary education, secondary education that they have now split into two: the junior and senior secondary school. In the United States, we have a different system but its comparable. We have great schools, middle and high school, all of these are the same when segmented and compared. Before, Nigeria used to have higher school that you will go after you finished secondary school, strengthen you in the basic subjects, mathematics, physics, chemistry, sometimes economics because of arts. Then you go to university for four years in most of the disciplines. By and large, this is what most countries practice. The problem with Nigeria is in the implementation. A lot of things have crept into the educational system of Nigeria to basterdise it. For example, dishonesty in exams. This is something that one would not have thought of in those days. There were very rare. These days, you have even some secondary school administration urging students to cheat so that the school can have a good pass record. These are things that were unheard of. So, number one; insincerity and dishonesty have crept in. Second, there has been a continuous deterioration in the basics, language, mathematics and so forth. Yes, we do have a few stars doing well here and there and you see them enter international competition and win but that is not the measure of the overall strength of the educational system at that level. We need to look at numbers. In terms of numbers, Nigeria is falling behind. Then in terms of infrastructure to support education itself, basically, at all levels, Nigeria is poor. We don’t have the right teachers, sometimes in a school, some subjects have no teachers. We can attribute some of things to the rapid increase in school age educational requirement. We have too many children wanting to be in school and the schools are not enough. But, certainly, the deterioration is inimical to the national aspirations of Nigeria. Let’s go the tertiary level, where the deficiencies are best felt. You know that ASUU is constantly on strike for one benefit or the other that have been promised and not given and the disruption of the educational system, something that was very rare in the past. The only time I can actually remember in my days in the university was the Ali Must Go episode during Babangida regime then. But before then there was nothing like that even the Ali Must Go, wasn’t so pervasive as what it later became strikes in Nigerian universities for a whole academic session. When that happens, it disrupts the educational system with great impact in the socio-economic development of the country and achievement of her manpower needs.
So, what is the way forward, especially, steps needed to be taken by government to remedy the situation?
Well, every government that comes in must have priorities. The country has many options, and many competing interest, that confront an incoming government. The health, some people will say that it should be number one, others will say that infrastructure should be number one, energy system is the engine of every economic development, some will say education and so on. But education should be number one. Any country that does not invest significantly in education is making a very serious mistake. Some countries in Africa have decided that they will invest 30 percent of their national budget on education, Nigeria should do the same. In Nigeria, it is even more critical because the population that Nigeria has to educate is extremely large. One-fifth of Africa is Nigeria by population. So, educational system should have the lion share of the country’s budget. There are a lot of wastes in Nigeria and when you recover those wastes, you should prioritize education as a destination for that money that you have saved. We have often said that the Nigerian governance system is just too large, there is a lot of savings to be made there. When you made savings there, you introduce that savings into educational initiatives for the support of three main sectors of education, infrastructure, processes and personnel, and engender competition. Let there be the basics; keep primary schools to local government areas; train them, and then, let the states deal with secondary schools and the Federal Government deal with universities, colleges of education and polytechnics and set standard across the board for all them to achieve, including both the public schools and the private schools and this country will rise up.
You earlier, talked about incessant strike actions by members of Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), what can be done to address the perennial challenge?
I have written about this problem about 10 years ago and then gave a keynote speech at the Association of African Universities Vice Chancellors in Uganda. I also repeated that speech with minor modifications at the University of Lagos lecture some years ago. The Federal Government is partly to blame for the maladies that you have today and the universities are partly to blame. First, let’s look at the Federal Government. They rarely keep promises that they make. They borrow money from the World Bank and many other banks and rarely put this money into university education anything significant enough. By comparison, if you look at what they put this money into, they are frivolous, because they never yielded dividends on these investments as education would by supporting the universities. That is where the Federal Government is to blame. But then you look at the universities themselves, they rarely decide to be entrepreneurial. They are still operating in the old mode of the university is an Ivory Tower, and must be divorced from the challenges of its environs. You cannot do that in modern day university education. I have served in about seven universities in four countries and headed institutes and come to realization that leadership is a major problem of universities in Nigeria. How is the leadership appointed. A lot of them are politically motivated appointments. You rarely have visionaries being appointed as vice chancellors. The few things I have done in some of these places that you recognized, was because I came prepared. I did not seek any political patronage for such appointment and this is what continuous to be the main drawback. A lot of universities are led by people who should not be in the leadership. The priorities support for the board and sycophancy to state governors and federal institutions, than to take strong stand about the inculcation of entrepreneurship into their university systems. They do not maintain much discipline. Ethnicity also comes in. To be a vice chancellor these days, people have to lobby. From the community, we want our son this time. This is not the sort of thing that should not be happening in centers of knowledge.
Nigeria celebrated 64th independent anniversary on October 1. Are we anywhere nearly the dream of our founding fathers?
Nigeria just like what happened to many other African countries that got independence between 1957 and 1965, there were many African countries in those ranks, Nigeria being 1960, started out with great plans and great hope and targets but along the line, it faltered. Across Africa, these countries faltered because of governance breakdown. There was lack of effective governance. Some went into depression, military coups and people who came in were not the right people to lead those countries; so things fell down. In 1980s there was hope because there was return to democracy in 1980s and 1990s in many countries. In Nigeria, the return to democracy was that of ex-President Olusegun Obasanjo, who came in 1999. So, there was a lot of hope. In truth, Obasanjo did a lot for the universities in Nigeria because he personally supports intellectual development. He himself indulges in that and he brought a lot of capable hands into government. But soon after that, we have the startup of mushroom universities which barely have facilities to train students appropriately. Even before Obasanjo came in, the military brought an era of leaders of universities being appointed to serve the interest of military governors and the presidency; then began the fall of Nigeria’s educational system. People were appointed as deans through lobbying rather than expertise, experience and training. Until today that persists. This is the problem with educational system. Look at the selection process for a vice chancellor of a typical Nigerian University, even the private ones, if you don’t belong to the church of the owner of that university, you cannot be a vice chancellor. Where do you hear that one? Imagine if Botswana insisted that I must be from Botswana to be vice chancellor! Imagine if China, where they gave me very senior professorship insisted that I must be Chinese; why is it like that in Nigeria. If you look at typical Nigerian university, you may not see a single foreigner on the faculty. When I was a student, there were several of them. So, how can you have knowledge from other cultures? The word university means universality of knowledge. Knowledge comes from many places and cultures and when they are inter-mixed in a place, students benefit from it. Students benefit from the potpourri of ideas from different parts of the world. But you don’t have that anymore. Even to become a dean or vice chancellor in a place, you have to come from that environment. Sometimes, the people from that local government area will insist that the vice chancellor must be their son or daughter. These are not things that should be in any university. Certainly, also universities need facilities. There has been a continuous degradation of facilities universities, in all sectors of knowledge. One of the things that I did propose when I authored Nigerian National Science Technology and Innovation Roadmap 2030 about three, four years ago, was that there should be a Central Research Facility, perhaps in Abuja, or regionally dispersed of all the imagined types of equipment in a location because universities cannot afford the equipment, because they are very expensive. Some of them are 2 million dollars and 3 million dollars. But if you have that in a place, the PhD students, master’s students, processors, post-doctorate students from different universities can come there and make use of the equipment, We are in AI today, robotic and all kinds of things that Nigeria cannot afford to be left behind. These steps have to be taken but unfortunately, it doesn’t seem that anybody is thinking in this regard and trying to get this done because it takes assemblage of experts to sit and do this. If they even form Tasks Teams, they will make them political. To select somebody, you have to be a supporter of the governor but what does a governor know about how to do these kinds of things. They have very limited knowledge. In most of the states, the governors assume to be the emperor of knowledge. A governor in a state is not really the epitome of knowledge. There are people that they should consult, not consulting sycophants only, who come in and agree to everything. So, pride has to go down in governance in Nigeria to attain the greatness it deserves and to attain the promise that was apparent at independence in 1960.
The recent increase in electricity tariff exposed the lack of preparedness of Nigerian universities for the challenges of the future, what do you make of this and what would be your recommendation for addressing the energy crisis in the universities vis-a-vis the nation?
There are two levels to that: one is the contribution of the university research system to amelioration of the energy challenges of Nigeria. They can do this through research, consortium; through information dissemination. But part of the problem there is the disconnect between town and gown; between the universities and the policy-makers. You rarely have any minister or any agency director inviting top-notch professors to sit down and discuss how can we do this. That contribution has to be research in the local method, policy integration, training and all of that to support the energy system of Nigeria. The other one is that universities should themselves for their campuses indulge in diversification of energy resources. What happened to solar, wind, and others? Why can’t the Physics department come up with something, what resources do they need. Why don’t the Governing Councils generate money and cease being governing council of contractors who come and beg the vice chancellors for building construction contracts and focus on the main things that will make these universities grow? How can they think that way when you see the list of those governing councils appointed by the President all are politicians? What do they know about all this? So, I keep saying that the universities should not be crying about the unaffordability of electricity because they can do solar. There could be street lighting with solar. Laboratories can be lighted at night with solar. Even individuals in this estate have solar; even in this house that I’m staying have solar. Why can’t universities install solar panels in every building? If they do not have money to do this, why don’t they get loan from any of these banks?
Nigeria, no doubt, has a lot of environmental challenges, oil spillage in the Niger Delta, erosion, and flooding among others, what can you say is your personal contribution towards ameliorating some of these challenges giving your expertise in form of give back to the country that made you?
I can talk all day on this one, why because I have more than 25 years experience coming from America in dealing with Nigeria environmental issues sometimes at the invitation of the Federal Government of Nigeria. You may very well know that my involvement in environmental science and engineering is not an interest; being a Distinguished Professor of environmental engineering for the past 38 years in the United States and many other countries. I helped Nigeria transformed FEPA to the Federal Ministry of Environment. It was the Federal Environmental Protection Agency in Lagos and I helped transformed it during Obasanjo’s time from FEPA in Lagos to the Federal Ministry of Environment that exist today. I wrote a lot of the framework document and named the National Oil Spill Detection and Response Agency, NOSDRA. Obasanjo sent Dr Ime Okopido, Minister of State for Environment to come to me at the University of Massachusetts, USA, where I was a Distinguished and Professor and Institute Director, to create NOSDRA. I created and named NOSDRA and it is still there today. NOSDRA technical document on oil spillage in Nigeria, I’m the author. A copy is sitting here. The Abuja environmental framework, I’m the author; that was sponsored by UNDP in 2012. It is sitting there. It was in collaboration with FCTDA. The National Solid Waste Management Manual of Nigeria, I’m the sole author through the Federal Ministry of Environment and many other documents. These things are there but your critical question is what about implementation, even 20%. But nobody, except NOSDRA is somewhat active. NOSDRA is the National Regulatory Body on environment. NOSDRA has been doing well even in the US, I have been reading about what they have been trying to do. But the other agencies are impotent. They don’t have the personnel and the motivation. They don’t have the equipment. For 25 years, I was an adviser to the Nigerian Senate on environmental matters. They used to have Senate Committee on environment and ecology. I had even given a National invited lecture by Nigerian Senate at their summit in 2012, where I laid out all that is needed to be done. I’m very familiar with environmental matters. But in Nigeria advice falls on deaf ears. Political office holders gravitate to where contracts are and don’t really care whether the person is providing that service is adequate or not. This country needs biennial national environmental assessment report. That is where you will know all the challenges in the environmental sector and how to address them: flooding erosion and many other environmental hazards. That is the reason the ecological fund was set up and is being used on that very way on few occasions. In the past, It used to be pocket money for governors under security. Is that what that fund was set up for? The Fund takes about 3 to 4% of Nigeria’s revenue. Money getting there on daily or monthly basis, but they are not using it for what they are supposed to use it to do. Even the work that we did for many years, they still have not paid for it. Nigeria is a very big country. They should expect many disasters in the future. I have few unengaged scientists saying that this country is very blessed, there are no disasters. There are disasters coming, we have just seen ravages of flood in different parts of the country. That has been the case with erosion. The epidemics will come. Nigeria was lucky in the last two to three epidemics that came, other countries suffered more but when you have environmental challenges coupled with health, Nigeria will be in trouble. Why because of its massive population. The impact will be very difficult to address. So, in Nigeria, the best approach is preventive rather than remedial.
Interestingly, you are also a poet. Can we have an insight into some of your works in that direction?
Yes, I’m also a poet. I always describe myself as a geoscientist and philosophical poet. I don’t see boundaries among disciplines. That is how I have always been. My background is multi-disciplinary. I have a bachelor’s in geology; bachelor’s again in soil engineering; master’s in environmental civil engineering, transportation and statistics and I have a double PhD in geotechnical engineering and civil engineering materials with minor in mineral resources. That has been reflected in the professorship that I have held. Yes, my background is cross-disciplinary but I write poetry. I’m currently engaged in the Brownbard poetry series. Brownbard is my poetry name and my current project is to produce the most elaborate poetry series in history of many poems of 8000 in 60 books to be released in 2026. We are about 80% of the way there. We will work very hard over the next two years to produce that. The poetry series covers all aspects of human life, lifestyles, emotions, war, development, historical context, antiquity to the present. We have invested a lot of energy time and money on this. It is a 10-year project and we are in the eighth year.
You were the pioneer President or Vice Chancellor of AUST, doing great work and you left rapidly, what really happened?
I came to AUST because of interest in what was communicated to me as the institutional mission. Of course, I shared interest in that mission with the board members, people who promoted the University as a continental university that was established under the Mandela name, to promote the intellectual development of Africa in terms of producing wonderful graduates that will be emotionally stable, independent and original thinkers. When I came, the first six months were great because I was able to convene some of the best brains in specific fields regardless of their race, nationality and I was delighted that a lot of them were Nigerians. Nigerians are intelligent people and I brought them from different countries to come. I constituted an excellent temporary faculty because we did not have all the money. We engaged, World Bank because the chairman of the Council of the University, Dr. Okonjo Iweala was associated with the World Bank before and we had the luck that she was also the Minister of Finance of Nigeria and the Coordinating Minister of Economy. We had support from many ministers. AUST was the go-to-place for many ministers, senators, ambassadors of other countries to Nigeria. We held event and exposed our students to those great people. I convened the leaders in the Nigerian petroleum industry and other industrial sectors to come and offer help and they did; they responded very well. We held African-wide conferences and grabbed some of the best students in Africa. But all of those fell because of the typical thing and I must say that the board was responsible for that failure. Some people at the university decided people owe should allegiance to some small girls and small boys above the level of the vice chancellor. They should sit and make rules for the university and sit atop the University administration and oppose measures that were working very well. So, I had no other option than to leave. I resigned immediately because I was not in need of the job by the time I came. I was being canvassed for recruitment in many places across the world. It was a tragedy, the university thrived for a while and I give kudos to those who succeeded me, they tried but unfortunately that university presently is not where is supposed to be. I have no doubt that if we had continued the way we were going AUST would have come out to be the best University in the developing world because we were moving very fast. We were getting talents both at the faculty level and at the students’ level. We were setting up framework for entrepreneurship so that the University will be financially independent later on.
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