ASUU PRESIDENT INTERVIEW IN SUNDAY VANGUARD

Prof Emmanuel Osodeke, President of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) granted press interview to Sunday Vanguard, August 28, 2023 and sought fruitlessly to suggest a pragmatic roadmap for running institutions of higher learning especially Universities in Nigeria. I pity Nigeria’s university teachers because of lack of knowledge about the principles of federal system of government. ASUU president while condemning Buhari’s outrightly discreditable running the education sector, pontificated while answering a question on what kind of Minister of education he would suggest to President Tinubu said: “Such a Minister should be somebody who knows what a University is and who knows what education is. Two, he should be somebody who has the interest of Nigerian pupils, young boys and girls, at heart. “Three, the person should be somebody who has his family in the Nigerian University system, secondary and primary schools, not somebody whose children are outside the country studying. These are some of the qualities the next Minister of education should have”. In addition to inadequacy of running the education sector, Osodeke spoke about poor annual budgetary allocation to the education sector which has never exceeded five 5) percent. Why I said that I pity Nigeria’s university teachers is that an educated person in the teaching cadre that has reached the apex of promotion to Professor ought to have known little of systems of government the world over. Department of political science is in the Universities and year one course is the system of government which is an extension of the Advanced Level Government. In addition to that, department of political science in Nigerian Universities have courses on the system of government in the First Republic in Nigeria which is “Federal System of Government” with the inexorable principles like over 90 percent of Items in the Legislative List in the Regional Governments while the Federal (Central) Government had only three ministries viz: Foreign affairs, defence, and immigration. In sane and sanitized Federations the world over, the central government has no business running ministries like education, health, agriculture, security, commerce, etc because the Regional or State Governments as in the US , Canada , Nigeria,to name but a few, explore and exploit the natural and mineral resources within their respective jurisdiction to run these ministries (and agencies as there is need for their establishment). Out of the revenues generated by the Regional Governments they paid a given amount to the Federal Government to be able to run common services and things were going well until the ultra conservative Cabals who introduced rigging in the census population and federal elections truncated the First Republic which led to military adventurism in the governance of the country. The inexorable principles of federal system of government were strictly applied in the First Republic in Nigeria and the Regional Governments initiated policies, Programmes and projects in sync with the values of their ethnic nationalities that made up the Regional Governments. Things were going fine and there was what was called “Competitive Federalism”. What is expected of the university teachers is to join the progressive elements and ethnic nationalities in the middle belt regions and southern part of the country to stridently push for the immediate Restructuring of the lopsided Federation to reinvent the inexorable principles of federal system of government. Nobody is calling or advocating for the return of the Four Regional Governments but to convoke National Conference of ethnic nationalities to brainstorm on how the country would be operated. For instance the Six Geopolitical zones can be conveniently be used as the new Federating Units. Consequently, the respective geopolitical zones will know what their people want in education, among other sectors and initiate pragmatic roadmaps on how best to meet the deep yearnings and aspirations of their people. It is a height of foolishness and naivety to expect the Tinubu Administration to run the education sector to meet the deep yearnings and aspirations of all the ethnic nationalities in the country. For instance, what Anambra state people want in education is a far cry from what the Zamfara state people want. This is the simple fact Professors should have known and not the preposterous and ludicrous suggestions of the ASUU President. By Polycarp Onwubiko, public policy analyst.