Tag: Festus Iyayi

He lived for his beliefs. He died for his beliefs. That is the glorious obituary of Festus Iyayi, professor of Business Administration at the University of Benin (Uniben), famed novelist, civil rights activist, former Academic Staff Union of Nigerian Universities (ASUU) president and consuming patriot, who died in a road crash on November 12.

His death was totally avoidable, but for the lawless jungle that is the Nigerian road, particularly when the high and the mighty are in transit. The three-vehicle convoy, in which the late Iyayi with 14 other ASUU colleagues were travelling to Kano for an ASUU National Executive Committee (NEC) meeting, was on its right lane. But then, a car from Kogi State Governor Idris Wada’s convoy, reportedly shot out of its own lane and rammed into the vehicle conveying Iyayi. The impact made the vehicle to somersault several times. Iyayi reportedly died on the spot.

Iyayi could also perhaps have been alive today if the Goodluck Jonathan presidency had been less tardy in its handling of the ASUU industrial dispute, for which universities nationwide had been shut these past four months. It was en route to resolving the matter that Iyayi met his death. If the government had kept faith with its agreement with ASUU, there would have been no strike. If there was no strike, Iyayi would not have died on the way to resolving the present one.

If Iyayi’s death is a point of departure, and the Nigerian government would henceforth keep to its agreements, and there are no future ASUU strikes, perhaps Iyayi would have died for a worthy cause. But would there be such a future educational el Dorado?

Whatever the future holds, in a Nigeria of moral free fall and scandalous flip-flop, Prof. Iyayi distinguished himself as one of the few men of conviction and character. Added to the normal brilliance which ought to be natural to an academic, he was solid gold to his generation.

As a young academic, and famed novelist even if his discipline was Business Administration, he stood almost alone against the awesome machine of military President Ibrahim Babangida, on account of ASUU activism and his relentless quest for a saner Nigerian academia. He was bruised no doubt, and even endured a purported sack by Uniben, under Prof. Grace Alele-Williams, Nigeria’s first female vice-chancellor. He however stood his ground and eventually triumphed with a judicial recall to his university job.

As ASUU president (1986-88), he maintained his chequered history of academic activism, based on solid personal conviction and rare ideological clarity: conditions on Nigerian university campuses must be radically improved. For that he ran into trouble with the military overlords, which was to be expected, given the generally reactionary bent of such juntas.

But Iyayi’s major challenge – and triumph – was not against the military. It was rather against his own peers, professors in the system, who considered their careers made and would not be bothered by the ‘misguided radicalism’ of Iyayi and his ilk. Well, Iyayi lived enough to see the professorial rank now radicalised enough to seek election as ASUU activists.

Iyayi’s vision was therefore clear: fix first the rot in the university system, and everybody, from the lowest to the highest academic, would benefit. That message is sinking in. And to those universities that take glory in demonising ASUU’s striving; yet are not averse to enjoying its sweet result, Iyayi as martyr of a sound Nigerian university system, can only mock their being clever by half.

Iyayi believed in this noble cause, so much so he died on active service. His heroic death should motivate every right-thinking Nigerian; and push the infamously tardy Nigerian governments to be more alive to their duty.

Adieu, consuming patriot!