Skip to main content

Dissecting The Politics Of LASU’s 9th Vice-Chancellor: Who Will Wear The Crown? By Olalekan Akinloye

The tenure of the 8th substantive Vice Chancellor of Lagos State University (LASU), Professor Olanrewaju Adigun Fagbohun, will end on 11th January, 2021. However, there are a number of Professors who have been shortlisted for interview, which is scheduled to take place on Monday 21st December, 2020. Among the five already shortlisted candidates, there are clear two frontrunners, Professor Ibiyemi Olatunji-Bello and Professor Olumuyiwa Odusanya both of the College of Medicine, Lagos State University. The other three contestants are not pushovers. They include Professor Senapon Bakre and Professor Kabir Akinyemi, both of the Faculty of Science, Lagos State University, and Professor Muyiwa Awofolu, Namibian University of Science and Technology.

Prof. Olatunji-Bello is not new to the game. This is her 3rd attempt at the goal, and the chances that she will be appointed as the 9th Vice-Chancellor are quite bright. She is a Professor of Physiology, an astute academic and an administrator per excellence. Ibiyemi once served as Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Academic) and later Acting Vice Chancellor of Lagos State University. She is the current Director of the Directorate of Advancement, office of the Vice Chancellor, Lagos State University. Olatunji-Bello is also Chairman, 2020 National Working Committee of the Committee of Wives of Lagos State Officials (COWLSO). 

Professor Olumuyiwa Odusanya came to limelight in LASU politics with his appointment as the Director of Research and Innovation, Lagos State University, by the outgoing Vice-Chancellor. Odusanya is a Professor of Public Health and Consultant Community Physician. In his role in the Directorate of Research and Innovation, he has to his credit two well organised Research Fairs in LASU in 2019 and 2020.  What is interesting about his candidature to the position of the 9th Vice-Chancellor in LASU is how and why he has been shortlisted without a PhD degree. Although he possesses the Fellowship certificate of the National Postgraduate Medical College of Nigeria, the advertisement for the position clearly states that such a candidate must be a scholar with significant impact in areas of international supervision and examination of PhD, and must also have supervised students (especially PhD). You cannot supervise a PhD if you do not possess a PhD Degree. The question that is facing the Joint Council and Senate Selection Committee, headed by Professor Bayo Ninalowo, the Chairman of the Governing Council is how it arrived at shortlisting Professor Odusanya few weeks after the Governing Council of the University dismissed many academic staff across different cadres for not possessing PhD. 


There are feelers among staff that the inexplicable exclusion of those who have become Professors, but without PhD, was as a result of the outgoing Vice Chancellor’s desire to have Odusanya as his successor. The question however, is whether a university that is currently flushing out some of its academics without PhD on account of lack of academic progress can afford to have a Vice Chancellor who does not possess a PhD. One of the issues raised against the predecessor of Fagbohun, Professor John Obafunwa, by the staff unions at the peak of the 2014/2015 crisis that rocked the University was that he was unfit ab initio to lead the University, since he didn’t possess a PhD. 

At the valedictory speech of Fagbohun on Friday 18th December, 2020, shouts of ‘incoming’ could be heard each time he eulogized Professor Odusanya, who was in attendance. It is not out of place for an outgoing to be interested in who succeeds him or her. However, caution should be served as Fagbohun should not assume to possess a divined-grace-gift to LASU to warrant him become a schemer of a successor as a matter of his choice and caprice. The recent call by some ‘opinion leaders’ in LASU that Governor Sanwoolu, the Visitor, should pick the next Vice Chancellor on merit has been described as part of a coordinated media effort set to intensify in the last week of the year to force the hand of government in appointing a candidate that enjoys the backing of the outgoing Vice Chancellor and the Chairman of Council. The shortlisted candidates meanwhile, continue to explore all avenues to make their cases by visiting political leaders and traditional rulers, including the wife of the former Governor of Lagos and current Senator, Remi Tinubu, whom some have said to have promised Odusanya in discussing him with Asiwaju Bola Tinubu who is believed to have the final say on the matter.

It is unclear yet where the pendulum will swing in this race for the position of the 9th Vice Chancellor of LASU. Beyond the two leading candidates, the other three also have outside chances. Although Professor Akinyemi is also said to be statutory unqualified, having not met the 10 years’ post-professorial experience stipulated in the advert. It is on the same basis of this 10 years’ post-professorial experience that a former Deputy Vice Chancellor (Academic) to the outgoing Vice-Chancellor, Professor A.O.K Noah was disqualified. This is what is fueling the feeling in some quarters that the Joint Council and Senate Selection Committee seems to vary the conditions in the advertisement in order to suit some and disqualify some others. There is thus a burden of demonstrable transparency on the Ninalowo-led Committee, to ensure that a new round of crisis does not engulf the University on the basis of the selection process.

The call that merits should be considered on the appointment of the new LASU VC appears unwarranted, especially without a proper articulation of what merit in this case entails. Beyond the proxy war, all the five candidates have some merits, to a reasonable level. It is only the Governor and Visitor to the University, Mr. Babajide Olusola Sanwoolu, who is bestowed by the LASU Laws of 2004 to make the choice among the shortlisted candidates after the Joint Council and Senate Selection Committee led by the Chairman of Council presents the details of the results of the interview to him. Whether the various political moves by the different parties will influence the Visitor’s decision, it is the LASU community that will bear the outcome, no matter how good or bad.

Olalekan Akinloye writes from Ojo, Lagos.

lekanakinloye64@gmail.com

Opinion

AddThis

: 

Original Author

: 

Olalekan Akinloye

Disable advertisements

: 

from 24HRSNEWS
via 24HRSNEWS



from EDUPEDIA247https://ift.tt/38h0cnS
via EDUPEDIA

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

These funny food quotes will make you laugh like crazy

Food is not only an essential part of the daily routine but also the most exciting one. We cannot imagine our life without something yummy. How do you make ordinary eating fun and unforgettable? We bring to your attention amazing food quotes which will definitely make you smile. Image: unsplash.com (modified by author) Source: UGC Are you looking for interesting ideas to entertain your interlocutor while having lunch at work or family dinner? Then this article is definitely for you! Good food quotes Below are food quotes, aphorisms and witty statements. This is an exciting and extraordinary collection of the top "pearls of wisdom" on this topic. Here you can find funny jokes and sayings, intelligent thoughts of philosophers and original words of great thinkers and inspiring statuses from social networks, as well as many other things. The best appetite comes without food. I love calories. They are dаmn tasty. An empty stomach is the Devil's playground. Have bre
Post a Comment
Read more

The Transitional Phase of African Poetry

The Transitional Phase The second phase, which we have chosen to call transitional, is represented by the poetry of writers like Abioseh Nicol, Gabriel Okara, Kwesi Brew, Dennis Brutus, Lenrie Peters and Joseph Kariuki. This is poetry which is written by people we normally refer to as modem and who may be thought of as belonging to the third phase. The characteristics of this poetry are its competent and articulate use of the received European language, its unforced grasp of Africa’s physical, cultural and socio-political environment and often its lyricism. To distinguish this type of poetry we have to refer back to the concept of appropriation we introduced earlier. At the simplest and basic level, the cultural mandate of possessing a people’s piece of the earth involves a mental and emotional homecoming within the physical environment. Poems like Brew’s ‘‘Dry season”, Okara’s “Call of the River Nun”, Nicol’s “The meaning of Africa” and Soyinka’s “Season”, to give a few examples,
Post a Comment
Read more

The pioneering phase of African Poetry

The pioneering phase We have called the first phase that of the pioneers. But since the phrase “pioneer poets” has often been used of writers of English expression like Osadebay, Casely-Hayford and Dei-Anag, we should point out that our “pioneer phase” also includes Negritude poets of French expression. The poetry of this phase is that of writers in “exile” keenly aware of being colonials, whose identity was under siege. It is a poetry of protest against exploitation and racial discrimination, of agitation for political independence, of nostalgic evocation of Africa’s past and visions of her future. However, although these were themes common to poets of both English and French expression, the obvious differences between the Francophone poets and the Anglophone writers of the 1930s and 1940s have been generally noted. Because of the intensity with which they felt their physical exile from Africa, coupled with their exposure to the experimental contemporary modes of writing in F
Post a Comment
Read more