Atiku passes vote of no confidence on Nigerian universities

The former vice president, Atiku Abubakar, says Nigerian universities cannot measure up with his secondary school, which he founded.

In delivering this vote of no confidence, in Yola last Thursday, Atiku said: ‘‘I was in the University of Zik in Akwa in Anambra State on Wednesday on the invitation of the university. There is no student in public universities that can speak English in an error-free manner like the head boy of my secondary, who just finished addressing us now’’

He further buttressed his point by saying: ‘‘When the head boy of AUN Academy, Abdullahi Sani, started speaking, I was thinking it is one of the lecturers in AUN, but only for him to introduce himself as the head boy of AUN Academy’’.

With Atiku’s remarks, his secondary school — not to speak of his university — doesn’t need any more advertisement. He has told employers where to look for recruits.

Personally, Atiku’s comments didn’t come as a surprise. Most elites and upper middle class Nigerians share this view. They will do anything to send their kids abroad.

Interestingly, it will surprise you that some of these universities in Eastern Europe that we are scrambling for are not better than University of Ibadan (UI). Anyway, this is a topic for another day.

But the former vice president refrained from blaming the real culprits: all past governments – including his. Instead, decided to de-market all Nigerian students in public universities – including all graduates of public universities.

The point is clear: There is nothing fundamentally wrong with most Nigerian students in public universities. Despite the lack of teaching infrastructure and dedicated lecturers, some Nigerian students still turn out to be the best in what they do. After all, most of the students in his secondary school – ‘who are better than students of UI, UNN and UNILAG’ — are still Nigerians.

It is important to note that most students do very badly in public universities because of financial hardship. Some students pay their school fees themselves. While some resume late because their sponsors are unable to raise money for them. But this is very unlikely to happen in the former vice president’s schools. (Maybe a well-structured scholarship scheme for indigent students will solve this problem.)

Besides, proficiency in the English Language is not the most reliable means of evaluating a student’s ability. I have met Chinese students who struggled with the language in England and still came top of their classes. These Chinese students had excellent mathematical abilities.

Such mathematically endowed students exist in Nigeria. A few months, Ekomobong Finbarr, a final year student of electrical engineering in the Federal University of Technology Owerri, designed and manufactured a solar-powered tricycle (Keke). Obviously, Finbarr can compete with students of AUN Academy and even those from the former vice president’s university.

Finbarr’s ‘invention’ has the potential of reducing poverty in Nigeria, significantly. Most tricycle operators spend a large chunk of their earnings on fuel – and this Finbarr has tried to eliminate in his design.

There are many Finbarrs from Nigerian universities doing well abroad and locally. And the few students, who cannot write letters and who might have got into the university through the back door, should not be a yardstick for discrediting our universities and their graduates.

There is no denying that all is not well with our university system. After all, that’s why ASUU is on strike. (Atiku has appealed to ASUU to suspend its strike, but with this comment I doubt if ASUU will listen to the elder statesman.)

The former vice president notes that the free education he received in Nigeria transformed his life and made him who he is today. The question elites like Atiku should ask themselves is this: Why has what worked for them as poor kids now failing the poor kids of today?