Fatunde: Letter to Governor Babatunde I am writing you this letter to share my thoughts and deep concern with you on the future of Lagos State University (LASU). Destiny has brought you and myself into close contacts. I shall make references to these contacts. The first contact was at the University of Benin, Benin City where you obtained your degree in Law under the close supervision of Professor Itse Sagay who was and still a committed member of Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU). I was then the Secretary of ASUU, UNIBEN , under the Chairmanship of late Professor Festus Iyayi. May his Soul rest in peace! From the records at UNIBEN, you came into the university in 1983 and graduated in 1987 at that time, tuition was free. Accommodation was 90 naira per session and the meal ticket was N1.50 kobo for the three meals – breakfast, lunch and diner. I want to remind your Excellency that university education was then highly subsidized which allowed me to sponsor my younger brother, Adewumi Fatunde, in the same Faculty of Law, UNIBEN. He graduated in 1986. I paid for his university education because my mother was a petty trader and my father was a low paid worker with Nigeria Railway Corporation. I obtained my Ph.D in a French University and was employed at UNIBEN as lecturer in 1980, at the age of 29. Thanks to the highly subsidized university education. What is the relevance of this history to my open letter? One of the immediate problems we confronted was the attempt by the Shehu Shagari Administration to introduce tuitions’ fees into the university. ASUU rose as one body to reject the introduction of tuition fees. We felt that this policy would close, for ever, the doors of learning, to young boys and girls who wanted to obtain university education. It was Ibrahim Babangida’s Regime under the Structural Adjustment Programme (SAP), that introduced tuition fees. The students, including your Excellency, paid “affordable” tuition fees. It was the joint struggle of ASUU and NANS which prevented the exorbitant fees to be introduced. I know Your Excellency is from humble, modest and honest background like myself. If the tuition fees were exorbitant, you would have terminated, midway, your university carrier. You would not have graduated as a lawyer from UNIBEN. To the second and third contacts. Those of us who knew you were a product of UNIBEN, were happy when you became a democratically elected Governor of Lagos State, the richest state not only in Nigeria, but in West Africa. Lagos has the highest Growth National Product (GDP) in West Africa. According to Barrister Femi Falana, the current Internally Generated Revenue of Lagos is about 20 billion naira per month. Your government has not denied this fact. Destiny has made you my Governor. As Governor, you are the Visitor of LASU where I have spent about 14 years. I have no regrets working in LASU because it is the sweat and labour of the good people of Lagos that is responsible for my welfare, security and happiness. I thank, once more, the people of Lagos as I have done elsewhere. However, your recent policies in LASU, as the Visitor, has turned my joy into temporary sadness. This man-made sadness can only be temporary if you are magnanimous enough to pull back the university from avoidable precipice as a result of your policies which are being implemented by Professor John Obafunwa, the Vice Chancellor who was a student, of the same generation with you, in another university, when I started my university carrier about 34 years ago. It pains me to inform you that ASUU of which I remain a member fought and repelled these policies to create an opportunity for you and Professor John Obafunwa to gain access to university education. Obafunwa’s background is similar to yours and mine. From poor homes! It was Obafemi Awolowo’s philosophy of highly subsidised education that gave the three of us opportunity to escape from grinding poverty, illiteracy and obtain self-actualisation. In my own life time, you and Professor Obafunwa are pursuing policies in LASU that would shut out, forever, children from poor homes in Lagos State and elsewhere from gaining access to university education. Lagos State Government has abundant money to drastically reduce tuitions in LASU. This 21st Century, is known as a century driven by knowledge Economy. It simply means that it is only those who acquire knowledge and training that can live meaningful life and deliberately create social goods and wealth in the society. With the current school fees regime in LASU, which is the highest in all public universities, Lagos will continue to be classified as an educationally disadvantaged State in Nigeria. It is not useful to Lagosians to witness the rise of the city as a Mega City when Lagosians, without skill, via education, cannot be employed to drive these mega projects! There are two major factors responsible for the current crisis in LASU. The refusal of your administration to implement the 70-year retirement age for professors. Your administration signed a Memorandum of Understanding with ASUU-LASU in December 2010 to the effect that your Administration will implement, immediately, and to the letter, all the aspects of the MOU including the retirement age clause for professors. Three years after your administration signed this agreement, you now want to renege on the same agreement by invoking un- necessary obstacles! Your Excellency, you are not only a very brilliant lawyer, you are also a well respected Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN). Your integrity is at stake here. Kindly implement without delay this aspect of the agreement; no more equivocation please! This is your teacher advising you accordingly. Instead of His Excellency inviting the striking workers to meaningful discussions with a view to finding solutions to the lingering crisis, the Excellency has resorted to high handedness tactics similar to the ones we suffered in the 80s in our struggle against attempts to commercialise education. The Governor has instructed the Vice Chancellor to stop my salary, stop check off dues, and instructed me to sign a register to go back to work; if not I will eventually be sacked. As I was preparing my response to these anti-democratic orders, I walked pass the monument of late Professor Ayodele Awojobi in Yaba; monument erected by Governor Fashola in honour of a university teacher who sacrificed his life for the truth. Looking at Awojobi’s statue, I became convinced and emboldened to devote myself to this struggle. I am also convinced that your Excellency will quickly do the needful for normalcy to return to LASU. Your Excellency, I shall obey to the last letter all the decisions taken by ASUU-LASU Congress because it is the highest decision making body of ASUU-LASU. No more, no Less! • Fatunde is Professor of French Studies, LASU. Source: ngrguardiannews/opinion/columnist/165437- fatunde-letter-to-governor-babatunde-fashola Fatunde: Letter to Governor Babatunde Fashola ngrguardiannews
Posted on: Wed, 11 Jun 2014 13:41:49 +0000
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