Adekunle Ajasin University (AAU) Vice-Chancellor (VC) Prof Igbekele Ajibefun has spoken of the institution’s plan to bail out indigent and physically-challenged students on fee payment. In this interview with WALE AJETUNMOBI, he states how the management has stabilised the school calendar despite challenges.
How is the institution coping in the aftermath of the students’ protest against increase in fees?
The protests that followed the fee increment didn’t take us unawares. We expected such fallouts. Anywhere there is an increase in fees, even if it is marginal, students go on demonstration. Our students protested in Akure, the state capital, and the government listened to them. The government invited the leadership of the students’ union, as well as the management and chairman of the Governing Council for deliberations on the issue. After the intervention of Governor Rotimi Akeredolu, the fees were drastically reduced. Afterwards, the students’ leadership took it back to their congress where it was decided to accept the reduction, having seen the commitment of the government tro reduce the fees by almost 50 per cent. The students immediately started registration. Now the university is settled and activities are going peacefully on the campus.
Management pledged to provide support to students in coping with the new fee regime. What form of support should students expect?
The council has approved financial support to assist indigent students in paying their fees. These include introduction of loan, scholarship as well as expansion of the existing Work-Study scheme, in addition to other forms of support. We have created a Students’ Support Centre under the Vice Chancellor’s office, with a coordinator appointed to coordinate the activities in the office. A committee has been set up to work out the modalities and criteria for the implementation of all forms of financial support to students. One of the categories of the support scheme is to cater for students who are physically-challenged. The application forms for financial support for this category of students are already out. The university will support the physically-challenged students with 50 per cent of their fee. Another area of financial support for students is the provision of scholarships for brilliant students, as it is done all over the world. This will promote academic excellence, as students will compete for the scholarships. With the establishment of the Students’ Support Centre and constitution of the committee to select beneficiaries, I think the university’s support scheme has started.
Since you assumed office, what have you done to improve the school’s rating?
We have built on the solid foundation we met on ground. The university has continued to make steady progress in all areas. In terms of infrastructure, we have progressed. We have over 10 capital projects that have been completed since January 2015 when I was appointed. And we have over eight other projects that are ongoing and at different completion stages. Two of the projects that will soon be completed are faculties of Arts and Education buildings. We are working on generation of electricity through solar power. The school is trying to initiate four megawatt solar power project on campus. Once this is achieved, the challenges associated with epileptic electricity supply on campus would be over and this would save the school money spent on diesel and maintenance of generating sets. The university recently established its radio station, Radio AAUA 90.3 FM, which was inaugurated last December. The station is an addition to infrastructure in the school, and this will enhance the academic programmes as well as socioeconomic life of host communities. We have continued to make progress in terms of academic development. We have initiated new collaborations with several universities within Nigeria and across the globe. Some of them include partnerships with Auburn University and Alabama State University in the United States. The institutions send professors to our university regularly for capacity building for our staff members and students. Some members of our academic staff have been to Auburn University for courses and trainings also.
We have also made progress in academic programme accreditation. There was a major accreditation in the university in November 2015, when 26 programmes were assessed. At the end of the exercise, the university had excellent performance with 25 programmes fully accredited. One got interim accreditation. That was a commendable outcome. Last year, we had another major accreditation with a similar success story. Our academic programmes have continued to witness expansion. All programmes offered by our fledgling Faculty of Agriculture have been verified successfully. The Faculty of Agriculture has recently established collaboration with the Nigerian Export Promotion Council (NEPC). With this collaboration, the university has been able to establish five hectares of Cocoa plantation, with further expansion plan. We recently organised a joint workshop with the NEPC in Akure where some important issues were discussed. I must add that we are not resting on our oars as we have several other plans to improve the school’s rating. We recently established the Department of Performing Arts. There was a resource verification exercise for the programme by National Universities Commission (NUC) about a year ago. It was successful. The university has enjoyed stability for a long period of time, except in 2016 when we had difficulties in payment of staff salaries. The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) embarked on a strike for four months. After that industrial action, none of the unions has gone on strike again. If you look at the trend in most Nigerian universities, it has been from one crisis to another, but AAUA has remained relatively stable and peaceful. I make bold to say that Adekunle Ajasin University is one of the most stable and peaceful universities in the country.
As you move to the last period of your tenure, what should members of the university community expect?
They should expect more progress and better things in the years ahead. I also have the belief that once we have a peaceful campus, better things will continue to roll in. For instance, the university is moving in the direction of expanding the academic horizon more. We are coming up with new academic programmes within the next few months. I think they are part of developments that will promote the school. We are already in touch with some well-to-do individuals who can support the university with funds to support the new programmes. We are also in touch with some international organisations and some of them have already shown interest. We have set up a committee to work on those areas. Very soon the new areas will come up. In terms of welfare, we shall continue to improve welfare of staff and students. We continue to look for ways to ensure we make everybody feel happy within the limit of resources available to the university.
How has the school fared in research?
Research is one of the cardinal areas for which universities are established. In AAUA, we shall continue to promote policy-relevant and problem-solving researches. We are making progress at the level of our available human and financial resources. We have some scholars here that are conducting researches that are winning laurels globally. They have won research grants from different prestigious organisations such as the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation (AvH) in Germany, and International Foundation for Science (IFS), Sweden, among others. The Centre for Biocomputing and Drugs Development in AAUA is at the verge of developing anti-diabetic drug and other important compounds. The centre, which has received great support from Nagasaki University, Japan, has collaboration with NAFDAC and other important agencies.
Do you think varsities should rely on subventions only?
When we talk of sustenance, I don’t think any public institution in Nigeria can cope without subvention from government. Nigerian public Universities will continue to depend on government for subvention in order to survive. The nature of public universities in this country is such that subventions are provided by their proprietors for both recurrent and capital expenditures. However, with the prevailing economic challenges in the country, the reality is that government alone cannot fund universities. With the declining trend in funding of universities, administrators are facing herculean task in running the schools. While it is important that governments continue to provide adequate funding for the universities, it is now incumbent on administrators to come up with innovative ways to generate funds to complement government’s subventions in running their institutions smoothly. This explains why most government-owned institutions now increase school fees. At AAUA, we are looking in different directions to complement government subvention. One of the directions is to raise the level of school fees from average of N23,000 per year for all categories of students to N70, 000 per year for our final year students, while other returning students now pay between N80,000 and N100,000 per year. The fresh students pay between N100,000 and N150,000 per year. In addition to the increase in school fees, the university is also taking steps to generate funds through endowment. This is already yielding positive results.
How have you coped with payment of staff salaries and allowances?
Regular payment of salaries has been a major challenge for us. While it is possible to manage with some other challenges, payment of staff salaries is critical to the smooth running of the university. Recognising this fact, we have been doing our best to ensure members of staff are paid, though not without having to leave some other important things to suffer, including payment of staff cooperative deductions, among others.We have had to cut down on several expenses just to ensure we pay salaries and make our workers happy.
On the NUC’s deadline on doctoral degree for lecturers, how well is AAUA complying?
We have encouraged our young lecturers to acquire their PhD degrees early in their career. With funds from TETFund for staff training, no academic staff has reason not to acquire a PhD within a short period. We will continue to encourage our academic staff to acquire their higher degrees. There are many of them on TETFund scholarship for their PhD within and outside the country.
Why do you think AAUA is relatively peaceful?
There have not been protests and industrial actions in AAUA for long time. We have only one case of industrial action in 2016 when the university had difficulties in paying staff salaries. After the strike by ASUU, which lasted for four months, there has not been any case of industrial action by any union in the school. We had only one protest by students of the university in 2016 when one of them died in an accident that happened outside the campus. That was the only case of protest since I assumed office in January 2015. The protests that followed school fee increment did not happen on campus, not even in Akungba but in Akure and government’s intervention quickly ended it. I can tell you that AAUA is stable and peaceful.
