Prof Patrick Oladipo Aina was appointed the Vice-Chancellor, Ekiti State University (EKSU), Ado-Ekiti on December 2, 2011. In this interview with ADEGUNLE OLUGBAMILA, the professor of Soil Physics from Ohio State University, United States, debunks rumours of impending fee hike. He said the Ekiti State Governor, Dr Kayode Fayemi, has raised the university’s monthly subvention
When you came on board, what challenges did you meet and how have you addressed them?
There were many, and by the grace of God we have been able to tackle them. The first was the declining academic culture that was associated with a number of factors on campus. The sale of handout was so rampant that once a student bought a handout, that student needed not attend lectures. It was also rumoured then, though it may not be right, that it (sale of handouts) was like a certificate. Teachers were not attending lectures. So the first thing I did was to stop the sale of handout to students. The directive had to go through the Senate of the university and it is now a law.
I also knew if I was stopping the sale of handout, then I had to replace it with something better. So I encouraged the academic staff to start academic publishing books – with incentives from the university to enable them publish good quality books – because I also wanted to improve the reading culture of our students. So for the past two years, sale of handouts has stopped and the new practice has come to stay.
What other loopholes did you block?
I found out that it was not only the students that were being extorted. I started codifying the account to streamline the account system. Some of the subsidiary charges paid to department are now paid to the university so that they would be better managed and that the money would not end up in private pockets.
There are rumours of a likely increase in tuition.
People often wonder how we are able to run the university with such low tuition; but they forget that we have internal mechanism in addition to the subvention from government.
We have a government that does not dictate to Governing Council to raise fees. Aside, our governor is intellectually inclined and he knows what it is to have a world-class university. He knows the state he is running is the second least receiver of federal allocation nationwide. He knows the people are poor and he is trying to improve their lots by making poverty a thing of the past. So he cannot over tax the citizenry. This is why he is also helping the university with linkages to top rated universities all over the world.
Some of the subsidiary charges paid to departments is now paid to the university so that they would be better managed and that the money would not end up in private pockets. But the tuition remains N50,000 because government has not mandated us not to increase, and we will not increase it.
This is why EKSU, when compared with other universities in the country today, is about the least-charging fees among public institutions nationwide. I want the public to know that there is no university anywhere in the world that is 100 per cent financed by government. Universities are repository of knowledge that can be marketed all over the world.
But beyond the tuition, students are complaining of other charges
Like in other universities, we have other charges. Students will register and the fee is N3,500 for the first year. In subsequent years, students pay N1,500. First year students also pay Acceptance Fee of N32,000 which is in order as compared with other universities because we are providing internet and that cannot be free. They pay for sports and register at the Health Centre with N7,500 that will reduce to N1,500 in subsequent years. And then the field trip is equally important. Students Handbook is N1,000 and that is for the first year only. We don’t charge all of them for field trip. Those in Geology, Agriculture, and Geography pay for field trip. That is why these subsidiary fees depend on students’ discipline. It is not that we charge across board. By the time we combine all these together, it adds up to about N40,000
However, if we compare this with what they were paying before in their departments, you will see that the total is still less. I’m sure parents are even happy now because they are paying less. In the past, parents came to complain that their children were demanding for N200,000, meanwhile, the school fees is just N100,000 or less than that. Now, we have students paying less than N80,000. Final year students in Agric and Law are paying less than N32,000. The total amount our students in Medicine are paying is N188,400 in their fourth year. They pay N100,000 for Clinical Studies which every student of Medicine must pay nationwide.
In the long run, it’s just like N88,000 which to me is ridiculously low. This is university is where we have top-rated professors. Over 25 and the limited number of students per class is 50. That is how we pegged it for Medicine and Law. With such a low number of students, you expect that the fees should be about a million. It means the fees they are paying is not up to one third of the salaries of the staff teaching them. In most private universities, students will be charged up to N1 million because of the 50 per class. So people looking at this would think this school will soon raise its fees but I tell you we are not going to do that. We have been coping with rumours of increase in tuition for the past two years.
What has been the reaction of students? Do they actually key into this?
I want to tell you categorically that students are not protesting. They are happy because they are paying less. You can go and talk to them. Before now, what they were paying for had no records but today they know better. You can imagine a student buying handouts worth over N50,000 aside various departmental charges. We have a good relationship with them. I interact with students. I go around classrooms to see whether my colleagues are teaching. I go to the market. A week ago, I visited some of the markets where students buy foodstuff to see what they experience. I went to their hostel and that gave me the idea that we need to have hostels on campus. Many of them live in dilapidated hostels and some of these hostels charges high rent.
We have a committee chaired by the Dean of Student Affairs we have set up a committee to include the landlords because we want to enforce the standards by pegging the rent. The committee now meets with landlord regularly.
Earlier, you talked about those investments the university is leveraging on. Can you identify some of them?
We are working on some of our investments so that in the shortest time possible, we will de-emphasise our dependence on school fees. We have EKSU Ventures that will go into investment portfolios. We have started making cement blocks, so that we can supply blocks to all the new structures that are coming on in the university. This also will form part of our entrepreneurship studies to our students, that is, our students will be taught the block-moulding skills. We are also starting the production of table water, and a bakery that will produce both cassava and wheat bread. We have a Guest House services. We also have the Ekiti State Consultancy Services. We have just finished a project for the Ekiti State Federal Government World Bank Projection Irrigation Feasibility. This is an outlet for marketing the outcome of our researches through consultancy services.
Lately, we established the Advancement Centre with a 22-member board headed by Prince Julius Adelusi Adeluyi, a distinguished Nigerian whose clout, we believe, will generate funds for the university. We look for endowment; we will cultivate entrepreneurship and philanthropy. All these we believe can make 30 per cent of our annual budget. Our operating budget is N7 billion a year; our subvention is about N4.2 billion, so we need IGR to subsidise this. We have linkages universities in South Africa, Great Britain and in US, and Canada. It might interest you that the government has facilitated over 50 per cent of these linkages.
You recently introduced new programmes. Does the university have the financial infrastructure to see them through?
All our programmes now have full accreditation status. The last time, this university put up 45 programmes for NUC accreditation and all of them were accredited except for some few that were given one year before being reaccredited. Full accreditation was more than 75 per cent but there was none that failed accreditation.
The new programmes we have just introduced are globally relevant, and will make our graduates stand competitive advantage. These programmes are now designed in a way that will also generate revenue. It will impact practical knowledge on students.
For example, look at Gender and Development Studies, it has entrepreneurial aspect and it is a programme that can attract linkages with other universities as well as research grants globally. We also have the Institute of Peace Security and Governance that is going to be established by Governor Fayemi. You know governance and security are so important in African context today. We are hopeful the programme will be oversubscribed when it eventually takes off. We also have Theatre & Media Arts and its diploma aspect.
In terms of ICT, we have the collaboration with GOOGLE Africa APPS wireless cloud projects to provide broadband internet access and state-of-the-art e-learning facility. The ongoing ICT infrastructure will be completed by next month. We also have WI-FI on campus and very soon the next Council meeting will be paperless. Once these facilities are on ground, we are going to start the e-learning and e-administration. Our Webometric ranking has also improved from 79 to 17.
On your assumption, you introduced the no sale handout directive. To what extent is this is being enforced?
I took the case to the Senate of the university, and fortunately members agreed with me. If for instance an academic staff sells handout, he is dismissed. If a student buys it, he is also dismissed outright. The vice-chancellor has been empowered to dismiss immediately if I can prove that handout were sold. I have twitter, and my lines are open. So if any student buys any handout from any lecturer I get alert on my line immediately. Since we made that law no student has reported sale of handout. Besides that, I go to lecture rooms.
Other vices like sexual harassment, examination malpractices, and cultism have gone down drastically. What we practise in EKSU today is instant justice. We have dismissed a good number of staff for sexual harassment. We have about 300 students suspended now on various allegation of examination fraud, and about 50 have been dismissed already. The disciplinary committee meets regularly now and members mete out these penalties on regular basis. Students now enjoy the lease of life on campus. They know they cannot go against the matriculation oath, while teachers as well dare not contravene the university law.
Have you encountered any backlash from workers?
I just thank God that I haven’t encountered any. You see, if a reform is favourable, and as a leader you tend to carry people along and let them know the end result and they see that the result is as accurate as you proposed it, the confidence will be reposed in you. More than before, workers now have confidence in the leadership of the university; and that is why there has never been any protest.
In terms of promotion and training, does a worker automatically get his due even if he meets his or her requirement or do you operate ‘no vacancy no promotion policy’?
We have not gotten to that stage yet. We still have vacancies and promotion. If you are due for promotion, rest assured you will get it. But we have a new process where you have to go through exams. The idea is just to remove this subjectivity in the assessment of staff. We realise that only verbal interview can be very subjective so workers go through about three exams series before the final round which is the oral interview. But most people get through anyway. And let me stay the staff have also bought into that.
What would you love to be remembered for at the end of your tenure?
I love to be remembered for my contributions in turning around this university to a world-class institution. That will be my greatest legacy. I want people to say one Aina was here and started this roadmap to making what this institution is today.
A world-class university is not only physical. Currently, we are having real ecstatic high value of our campus now than it used to be. I also want to change human beings, get my colleagues to be involved in cutting edge research that will not only turn around the fortunes of the state but Nigeria at large. io want our products to be known all over the world; I mean graduates that are job-creators.
