The nativity nonsense started at the University of Ibadan (UI) Nigeria’s premier university. Ibadan dons there declared it was time their town produced the university’s helmsman. They didn’t have their way beyond an acting vice-chancellor — and just as well. Prof. Kayode Adebowale, who got the job on October 13, 2021, hails from Ijebu-Igbo, in Ogun State.
This takes repeating: dons in UI — or any other university for that matter — are esteemed members of that community not because of their nativity but because of their scholarship and sundry acuity. So, were any Ibadan native to become vice-chancellor, it would be on personal merit; not by accident of birth.
That same logic shreds the Obafemi Awolowo University (OAU), Ile-Ife, absurdity, staged by obvious touts that branded themselves “traditionalists”. They savaged the university community with violence and assorted charms — condemnable acts that give Yoruba traditional faith a very bad name.
Remove the veneer of culture and tradition: those that stormed the Ife campus, visited the security staff at the gate with violence, laid siege to the place are guilty of unruly conduct. They should be seriously punished.
So, the police must thoroughly investigate the ugly incident, arrest everyone involved and trot them to the court for prompt but fair trial. Aside from the unruly band, their sponsors too should be found and given a similar treatment.
Whoever these sponsors are — native Ife OAU dons or any sympathiser from outside — the point must be made and made good: such loutish conduct cannot and must not be tolerated at OAU — a 61-year-old academic citadel, which has shaped the lives of many eminent Nigerians, including Governor Rotimi Akeredolu, SAN, of Ondo State, who was thoroughly riled by — and has slammed — the affront.
That an Ife indigene’s failed bid to become vice-chancellor sparked the protest is very provocative. At the end of the exercise, the OAU Governing Council had announced Prof. Adebayo Banire, a Professor of Agriculture, as vice-chancellor-designate.
But no sooner had that happened than supporters of Prof. Rufus Adedoyin, an Ife indigene, started protesting and asking for a summary reversal in favour of Prof. Adedoyin, a Professor of Physiotherapy. The pro-Adedoyin lobbies included the Ife Academia, the Ife First Advocate and sundry Ife nativists.
Yet, by the OAU Governing Council results, Prof. Adedoyin was not even among the top three: Profs. Rasaq Kalilu (a Professor of Art) and Kayode Ijadunola (Professor of Public Health and Community Medicine) came second and third, respectively, after Banire.
So, on what basis might they hang their push, beyond that Adedoyin is a son of the soil? — an outrage Oluwasegun Agbogunleri, one of the protesters as reported by Premium Times, shamelessly peddled, quoting alleged cases of UI, University of Calabar and University of Ilorin, where he claimed indigenes had been bossing the show as VCs.
But if indigeneship — not merit — were to drive a vice-chancellor’s appointment, what happens to the universality of universities, that very cosmopolitan ethos on which the global university tradition is rooted?
True, it’s no anathema were an indigene to become vice-chancellor. If (s)he did, it wouldn’t be because of any closed birth but because of rich and open minds — the very same criteria that qualify everyone in there as proud members of the academic community; and which also sustain them all through their career.
Nor should there be suggestions that the result of any exercise is so sacrosanct it can’t be challenged. But legitimate protest is one thing. Subverting a process, because it didn’t favour your cause, is another.
Now, add affray like threats and blackmail; alleged vandalisation of security posts and rough-handling of students and security staff, atavistic bullying via charms and flaunting of “traditional” powers, and raining of curses on “enemies of Ile-Ife”!
Indeed, all those involved in that show of shame must bury their heads in shame.
Prof. Wole Soyinka dismissed the Ife nativist excitement as “crazy”. On that, our own WS is spot on. It must be extra-painful for him that two universities — UI and OAU — which academic fame and universalist culture his fecund mind had helped to shape, are bogged down by this nativity and atavistic nonsense.
But then, the decay of the Town just invaded the Gown. It is exceedingly ugly in our eyes!