INTERVIEW
Why we revoked some Ph.D
certificates —VC, LASU
Internal crisis, especially at a
university community, is always rampant. Intellectuals drive home their points,
give the same story different meanings. However, Professor John Obafunwa, the
Vice Chancellor of Lagos State University (LASU), told Saturday Tribune’s NAZA
OKOLI that justice will prevail on a number of contending issues that stare the
school in the face.
 |
| Professor John Oladapo Obafunwa, LASU Vice Chancellor |
LASU, sir, it is crisis after crisis.
What is responsible for this?
Well, I wouldn’t really say it’s
been crisis after crisis. But yes, I understand what you are saying. But you
see, that’s in the past now. We have started our exams and things have been
going on smoothly. At the so-called peak of the crisis, students started coming
back; lecturers started coming back to give lectures. That tells you what? That
not everybody was in support of whatever was going on; they dared the
ASUU executives. Throughout the whole crisis, NASU never went on strike because
they understood clearly what the situation was. National Association of
Academic Technologists never went on strike. SSANU was on strike briefly; we
knew all about the attempts of ASUU to use some SSANU members. Issues with
SSANU are off. We felt there was some element of normalcy at that point in
time, but we still had some pockets of people trying to see how they could
distract the administration. Despite all the distractions in the last three
years, we were still able to achieve so much
So, this crisis… How did it all
start?
When I came in November 2011, there
was ASUU; there was an executive that I worked with for about a year. There
were no problems. So how come the union suddenly has a problem with us? The
only logical conclusion is that there were certain hidden agenda that some
people wanted to prosecute. You could discuss with the leaders of any of the
unions, particularly ASUU, get things sorted out, even when you had ASUU
members that were not doing the right things, the leadership of ASUU handled
the issue of erring members. But all of a sudden, we have a leadership that,
from day one, said “Sorry, we are not going to chat with you”. From day one,
they started talking to me about second term. I don’t think about such things,
otherwise, you will never be able to make changes because you want to parley
with everybody. That is not my intention.
Second term? Yours or theirs?
They were saying: “You cannot go for
second term”.
Would you know why they took that
position?
It’s all part of LASU politics. You
have people who say that nobody has ever gone for a second term in the history
of LASU. Either they kill him, or they make sure that he was forced out. I
don’t know….maybe some people were eyeing certain positions, and they felt that
if this person be allowed a second term, it would not allow for their own
ambitions. But I never allowed that to bother me. Like I said, if you are
interested in second term, you will not get things done; you will just maintain
the status quo. But that is not my intention. A lot of things have to be
changed; starting with the registration of students, getting results out, zero
tolerance for sales of handouts, ensuring that academics have the right
credentials, ensuring that you don’t continue to accommodate people who will
have been lecturers at a lower level for 15 to 20 years; what sort of message
are you sending to the students? There are so many issues that people on the
outside do not know. We had to deal with exam racketeering, we had to deal with
people who are used to collecting some allowances for occupying certain
positions, making so much money within the system.
So, it was while you were doing
these that you made some enemies out of the academic staff?
That’s right. And perhaps some
non-academic staff do not like what is happening. The administration has been
bold enough to implement certain provisions in their conditions of service.
These are some of the issues. Of course, we had to minimise interaction between
lecturers and students when it comes to exams assessment; taking the issue of
“sorting” and award of marks head on; insisting that if you’re submitting
questions, you must provide marking guidelines; marks cannot be given to people
arbitrarily, so that if I mark a paper and I award a particular mark, take that
paper with the marking scheme to Sokoto, another examiner will mark it and come
to about the same conclusion, maybe plus or minus two or three marks. These are
examples of things that the administration insisted on. And again, when people come
into the university, they should be able to know when they are going out. When
I got into the medical school, UNILAG in 1975, I knew that by 1980 I was going
to qualify as a doctor, and that was it. When I was posted to the medical
school, you walked in at 200L, you knew that four years from that time, 600L,
you should be getting out of the place. We never allowed any sort of strike to
disrupt activities in the school. When you sat for exams, within some two hours
of finishing the exams, results were ready, granted you were dealing with a
smaller number. And that is why we came here, we started with four weeks, we
said that results must be ready by then, and the last exams, under three weeks,
results were ready. We need to have a stable academic calendar, that’s
something that personally, I will not negotiate. And luckily, we have more and
more ASUU members coming together and saying we cannot continue in our old
ways. I have this letter from a section of ASUU, complaining about Mr Idris-led
exco. It states here that Mr Adekunle Idris-led executive has been suspended,
and that the new executive is committed to moving the place forward. Of course,
I’ve heard things like “the VC is sponsoring them”. This letter was written to
the vice chancellor and copied to the visitor, the chancellor, pro-chancellor,
special adviser on education. The interim executive is led by Comrade Asokere.
If you ask me to point to Asokere in a crowd, I don’t know him and that is a
fact.
But how can we be sure that the
suspension was done the right way?
There was an ASUU congress. A number
of stories are being put in the press, even informing the national ASUU. I
thought the national ASUU would at least try to find out the other part of the
story. I remember that on the 4th of November, a letter came from Mr Idris,
saying that national ASUU planned to have a meeting, and they would want to use
certain facilities, and they would like to have security provided. I approved
everything. It is customary that when ASUU comes, they would come and pay a
courtesy visit to the vice chancellor who would host them to a cocktail or
something like that. If there were grievances, if there were issues, things
like that would be raised at that forum, discussed and settled. So, this letter
came on the 5th and that same day, I gave all the approval. I was even looking
forward to meet the national ASUU, so that we’ll sit down and talk about
everything. National ASUU came, they did not even deem it fit to pay a courtesy
call to their host. When they came, they used our facilities; they said they
wanted to use it for two days (6th and 7th). But on the 8th, they were still
using our facilities till they had their press conference in the afternoon. And
they did not have the courtesy to even ask for the other side of the story. I’m
not interested in any courtesy call but it says a lot. And I just kept quiet.
Even while they were here, despite the fact that the approval was for 6th and
7th, I continued with what I was doing here. I’ve learnt, in some instances, to
just ignore people, pretend as if certain things do not exist.
ASUU has accused your administration
of promoting some staff members without due process.
The only way to promote anybody is
either through APA form and recommendation coming from the faculty, or by an
advertisement. There will be an interview, experts will come in from outside,
the results of interviews will go to the Appointments and Promotions Committee.
From there, it goes to the Governing Council. It’s after the approval of the
council that people can be promoted. The VC cannot promote anybody without the
concurrence of the council.
Isn’t ASUU aware that is the
process?
ASUU is aware, fully aware; the then
ASUU. But people say certain things just to create confusion, to
misinform the system, misinform the outside world. If I have to be bothering
myself with what is being said, I will not get anything done in this place. The
VC cannot promote anybody on his own; it has to go through a process. If there’s
anybody that they feel was promoted without going through the council, let them
mention the name. I’ve heard something like heads of departments have been
appointed…when it’s supposed to be deans that should appoint. That is not true.
Heads of department are not appointed by deans; they are appointed by the VC.
The Deans are only asked to recommend, I don’t have to accept their
recommendation. If I appoint you as my special adviser, you give me advice, but
I don’t have to take your advice because at the end of the day, I’m the one
that will be questioned; I’m the one that will be held accountable. If you are
going to hold the VC responsible for anything, the VC should also be in a
position to be able to hold certain people responsible.
The academic calendar, as it is,
provides for little or no break. Is it merely to make up for lost time?
One thing is obvious; the students
want this whole thing to end. And they have made the sacrifice, even coming on
weekends to do what needs to be done. A number of lecturers have put in a lot
of effort. On Tuesday (December 23), I was in College of Medicine for the
induction of new doctors. These are people who should have finished since
February this year now being inducted in December. That is a very strong
message. Since the inception of this administration, we have gone through three
consecutive convocations – 2012, 2013, 2014. Before this administration, for
five years or so, LASU did not have any convocation. And I recall last year in
the Senate, some people were advocating that we should wipe out the 2013/2014
academic session and some of us said no. we knew the agenda, so that there
would be a disruption of the academic calendar, so that it would be said that
this administration has not taken care of students; we knew that they didn’t
want the convocation to take place. But we were determined to do what we needed
to do so that people could go to Law School. We had a students’ crisis on
January 23. And after some time, we had to recall the students starting with
those in their final year, so that they could do their exams, get the results
processed through Senate on time for convocation as well as NYSC – particularly
NYSC, so that they could go with Batch B. And we achieved that. Meanwhile, some
people wanted us to cancel it, just like they tried to see if they could
disrupt this present exam, so that we won’t have the session ending in January
as planned. Because once we end it in January, between January and September,
we’ll be having an uninterrupted academic session; we’ll be back to normalcy,
and we would start the 2015/2016 academic calendar in October. And that is
something we are determined to see happen. We’ll finish this exam, people will
graduate, we’ll have our convocation, God willing, in February, and we continue
from there. Isn’t that supposed to be a good thing that would gladden the
hearts of students and parents?
The issue of Adekunle Idris: He was
awarded a PhD by this school; and the school has also withdrawn the PhD. What
kind of message does this send?
One, the VC cannot award a degree,
and as such, he can’t withdraw a degree. Making reference to the VC is to
muddle the water and make things seem like there is an issue surrounding the
VC. Whatever happened was a Senate decision. How did we come about these things
in the first instance? In one of the Senate meetings, it was mentioned that a
particular lecturer had refused to accept the PhD that was given to her
because, according to her, that was not what she applied for. One thing led to
the other. We then said: “Okay, Dean, PG School, Dean, Faculty of Basic Medical
Sciences, go and look into this thing and give us a report.” They came with 19
names and Senate looked at it. The day we had a meeting, 30th of October, we
had 93 Senate members at the least. Senate looked at the entire 19, and divided
the list into three categories. We had the Group One where they felt it was
straight forward, no problem. The second group, they felt there were mild
problems. The third group, serious problems. I can tell you that in 2004,
the university senate approved M.Phil/PhD Business Administration, M.Phil/PhD
Management and Mphil/PhD International Business. There is nothing like
Marketing there. Somebody was given a PhD in Business Administration
(Marketing) instead of the PhD International Business; that was how the whole
thing came up. Could the student have done this alone by himself? The answer is
no. There must have been some lapses from within if not outright connivance.
That’s a fact. That issue is being looked into; there is a committee working on
that. Now, I was talking about the third category where you have people with
PhDs in programmes that were never approved by the university; programmes not
known to NUC. The first group where we didn’t have any problem, we said “Leave
them alone. The second and third groups, withdraw their PhD, tell them to
return the PhD because the university no longer recognises those PhD. And then,
come and submit the letter given to you when you were doing your registration
for the PhD. When you did your conversion from M.Phil to PhD, you must have
been given a letter of conversion. Your dissertation too. We’ll now look at
everything. Where everything matches what you are supposed to have, you PhD
gets returned.”
Is that the stage now?
No, we’ve already gone past that
stage, people returned their PhD except probably about two or three people. But
of course, whether you return it or not is irrelevant because that piece of
paper is useless; it’s no longer recognised. The university has withdrawn that
certificate. If you don’t return it, you can keep it as a souvenir if you like.
By the way, not all of them are lecturers; some of them are not here. Of
course, they reached out to people who are not here and they complied except
for about two or three. We reviewed the whole thing and PhD were re-issued.
However, where your PhD does not exist, for example Marketing, you cannot have
it. The university cannot give what it does not have. The university cannot
award a degree that it is not approved to give.
Can you confirm the number of
candidates affected, and those whose PhD have been officially withdrawn.
I think it’s just about three or
four people that are left. I’ve asked the registrar to give me a lowdown and
she sent the information to me. If you have a PhD in Marketing and there is no
programme like Marketing, we cannot re-issue such a degree. You have to fulfill
the conditions that will merit that degree.
ASUU’s position is that Adekunle
Idris was being victimised.
There was no reason to victimise
Adekunle Idris. Don’t forget that it is this same administration that promoted
him to Lecturer 1 in 2012. He was not chairman of ASUU at that time. Things are
done according to the books. Being victimised because he fought for school fees
reduction? ASUU did not fight for school fees reduction, the students
themselves fought for it.
Yes, they fought for it for a long
time, then along the line, ASUU joined them
Excuse me, when the school fees were
increased in 2011, ASUU did not raise a finger in this university. The students
even wanted ASUU to join them but they said no, and that was how they started
paying it. So, ASUU was now trying to make it an issue hoping to get support
when they started their crisis last year; I’m talking about ASUU LASU. The students
went on their own and I remember, they even told ASUU “don’t fight for us,
don’t join us in your crisis.” When we went to Alausa to negotiate, ASUU was
not there. I remember that when they were trying to muddle things and put it as
part of their demand, they were trying to suggest that the increase in school
fees was brought about by Obafunwa when, in fact, the school fees had been
increased before I assumed office. And that was the first crisis I had to deal
with when I assumed office in November 2011. So for ASUU to be saying all that,
it shows the height of deceit and mischief. When they were adding it to the
list of their demands, I recall that the pro-chancellor asked them at the
meeting of the governing council, “What would you suggest?” And they said “N50,
000.” But when the governor was going to review the case, he went back to N25,
000. It was announced during the students’ convocation. ASUU was not even
there. It was a master stroke on the part of the state government. The same
ASUU that is saying “We want the fees reduced,” is also saying “We want this to
be added to our salary.” Do they want to kill the university? It shows the
level of insincerity.
If I may bring you back to Idris
Adekunle, don’t you think that the school should have identified and punished
those people in the system who were responsible for issuing him the certificate
just as quickly as the school has acted in withdrawing the certificate?
There is a committee. They wrote and
said they needed more time. But you cannot say because you want to look at what
took place inside, which is perhaps going to affect many faculties… you cannot
say because of that you won’t take a decisive action where something wrong has
happened. Hey, the Lagos State University has no power to award a PhD in
Marketing…
But it did
By accident; because of some
kind of misinformation. Are we saying that because it did, it should have been
sustained? Assuming someone was given a certificate as a doctor, but the
person never trained as a doctor, are you saying that the university should
allow the person to practise? No, you recall the certificate, and find out what
went wrong inside, so that it does not occur again. And I can assure you, that
is what we are doing.
CULLED FROM SATURDAY TRIBUNE OF 3RD JANUARY 2015.
