Scholars Without Boundary, SWB, on Wednesday, faulted the
position of the Academic Staff Union of University, ASUU, on the proposed
Muhammdu Buhari University.
Wife of the President, Aisha Buhari had during a town hall
meeting last Saturday in Yola, Adamawa State, hinted on the possibility of
establishing a university in honour of the president.
She had explained that the proposed project would be
established in collaboration with partners from Sudan and Qatar.
Reacting, the University of Ibadan chapter of ASUU lamented
that the declaration was a sad reminder of Buhari’s continued reduction of
budgetary allocation to the education sector since 2015.
Chairman of University of Ibadan chapter of ASUU, Omole
described the proposed university as a joke.
However, SWB, berated Omole’s stance on the
yet-to-be-established tertiary institution.
The group said such comment attributed to ASUU should only
come from garage urchins and not the academic body.
Speaking at a press conference on Wednesday, the scholars
through its president, Ibrahim Taiwo, said it was worrisome that ASUU seems to
have abandoned their major responsibilities of contributing their quota to the
peace and development of Nigeria to the obsession with frivolities and
diversionary irrational debates.
The group advised members of the union ASUU to rather
dissipate their energies on productive engagements to assist in the development
of Nigeria.
According to Taiwo: “And least of all, to understand that the
descent into this appalling level of unseriousness is coming from a section of
the academia, which should ordinarily be an assemblage or community of
intellectuals is a source of concern to all Nigerians.
“The wife of the President, Hajia Aisha Buhari recently
announced at a Town Hall meeting in Yola, Adamawa state, her intention to
partner with some foreign investors to establish a private university to be
named after her husband, President Muhammadu Buhari.
“This revelation sparked indefinable outrage in a section of
ASUU, which meaninglessly condemned and pooh-poohed the idea, advancing very
flimsy reasons. First, they wrongly aligned the idea of a private university
from private investors as conflicting with the public office held by President
Buhari.
“The chairman, University of Ibadan chapter of the Academic
Staff Union of Universities (UI-ASUU) Professor Deji Omole, termed it a
disaster and proceeded to slate the Federal Government of Nigeria over the
proposed plan of a private university which will adopt the nomenclature of
President Buhari.
“In another interview, ASUU’s former national treasurer,
Professor Ademola Aremu somewhat insanely advised Mrs. Buhari to influence
policies in education for the President Buhari’s administration to revitalize
public-funded education because universities are proliferated in the country.
“The arguments by both Omole and Aremu are fluid, childish
and incendiary. It only reminds of the motor-park wisdom the Late Chief Lamidi
Adedibu applied in running the political leadership of Oyo state behind the
scenes.
“Or how else, could one strike a nexus between establishment
of a private university and its bearing with the Federal Government outside the
approval for license? How does it conflict with public universities? Would the
proposed university be funded with public funds? What is really the grouse of
Omole and Aremu?
“Hajia Aisha Buhari is not a government appointee under the
government of President Buhari and she has not even the remotest connection or
influence with government business. How does Professor Aremu expect her to
officially influence policies in education?
“It’s safe to assume, Aremu and his co-travelers pass off as
part of the offspring in the office Adedibu left behind at Ibadan Motor park as
legacy. These gentlemen ought to be aware that Mrs. Buhari is even stripped of
the informal, bogus and influence-peddling appellation of “First Lady of
Nigeria,” and this detachment is reason she is simply addressed with the
prefix,” Wife of the President.”
“To put it bluntly, the duo’s personalized criticisms of a
proposed private university to be named after President Buhari, which they coat
with the garments of ASUU is an assault on the sensibilities of Nigerians. None
of the arguments projected against it is matured or sensible.
“For academics to argue in this manner is disgraceful to
Nigeria’s intellectual community, because silence would have been more golden.
We fear these so-called varsity dons didn’t even pass their own JAMB to have
become lecturers and harbingers of knowledge. We suspect these are intellectual
touts and not academics.
“Regardless of whatever the likes of Omole and Aremu feels,
and the hatred they delight in expressing against President Buhari, Nigeria has
known him as a rare leader, unquestionably incorruptible and a leader with
integrity. He is committed to the redemption and repositioning of Nigeria to an
enviable height. His scorecard in public leadership cannot be obviated by the
primordial and cynical thoughts of these dons.
“For a section of ASUU to begrudge the initiative of
Buhari’s wife to partner with foreigners to establish and name a private
university after him is a glaring attempt to provoke Nigerians. This is a
private investment and the investors are not prohibited by any law in the land
to give the university any name of their choice.
“We advise these ASUU members to dissipate their energies on
productive engagements to assist in the development of Nigeria. ASUU leadership
should be more concerned with cleaning up the mess they have senselessly
deposited in the university system in Nigeria through incessant feuds and
strikes at the detriment of students.
“ASUU leadership should be more worried with how they have
turned university campuses into shrines for breeding corruption and other forms
of debaucheries such as sex- for- marks, rape of female students, poor
proclivity for academic researches, plagiarism, promotion of the culture of
handouts, and citadels of learning where lecturers go on strike even when their
wives deny them of sex in order to create platforms of blaming government for
fallen standards of education.” – Premium Times
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