Invidious rumbling in an ivory tower

Chaos is reigning supreme at the University of Abuja where a leadership tussle between some professors and the Vice Chancellor is threatening to derail activities in one of Nigeria’s premier academic institutions.

As usual, and as suspected, what appears to be an insistence on due process, fairness and justice is, at the bottom, a barefaced disguise of the leadership problems and crisis of confidence that plague Nigeria as a country.

In 2024, fresh off the ugly crisis that rocked the Nnamdi Azikiwe University over the appointment of a vice chancellor, the University of Abuja followed suit as the forces opposed to the emergence of Aisha Maikudi, a professor of International Law, reared their heads. Beyond suspicions that discomfort at her gender and age simmer just beyond the surface in a country where women are expected to conform to certain roles, more than forty professors have said her appointment did not follow due process. They may seem to have a point about the years she has put in as a professor. While she has been in the university environment for a while, she only became a professor in 2022.

For all the allegations of illegality, it appears that those who are out to stop Maikudi are uncomfortable with her choice for reasons best known to them.

What is sad and dangerously so, however, is that somehow the vitriol that almost always accompanies removal or retirement, as the case may be, and replacement in offices in Nigeria is somehow seeping into universities which should be shielded from such for reasons that they are grounds where future leaders are prepared against such destructive vices.

It appears that gradually, the process of appointing vice chancellors in universities is being subjected to ruinous politics and politicization. But that should not be the case. The position of Vice Chancellor should be spared the dirty kind of politics that smears elections in Nigeria.

For the sake of education in Nigeria which continues to crumble by the day, it is important that only people of impeccable character, the highest qualifications and very high moral standing should be appointed as Vice Chancellors.

Education in Nigeria has continued to suffer all the setbacks it is currently suffering because as a country, Nigeria has stopped insisting on the highest standards in the education sector.

The process to appoint Vice Chancellor in any Nigerian university must always be seen to be transparent at all times. As sensitive as it is, the post of a vice chancellor should never be used to reward cronies or foster nepotism or mediocrity of any kind.

As for the aggrieved professors of the University of Abuja, they may have to consider sheathing their swords and working with the new Vice Chancellor unless the Federal Ministry of Education thinks otherwise. So far, it has failed to indicate that it has uncovered any foul play in the process which produced Maikudi.

Nigerians and long-suffering Nigerian students who have to ride all manner of storms just to get a university education should be spared the noisome antics of people who should be models but have instead reduced themselves to verbal fisticuffs and squabbles.

*Willie-Nwobu can be reached at ikewilly9@gmail.com

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