By Nkrumah Bankong-Obi
There is a church whose members transgress inside its hallowed entrances. In this particular place of worship which holds multiple meetings on Sundays, it is normal to find worshippers pushing and shoving to get in just as the superintending clergy offers benediction before the recession. Sometimes, this vaulting speed to select a choice seat results in minor injuries, ego bruises and verbal confrontations. But you know what, many times, there’d be so many unoccupied pews after the initial worshippers had vacated them. It leaves one pondering the rationale for the struggle in the first instance. Our attitude to power is also like that. We can be so close to it yet indulge in unwholesome practices to grab it. And when we have it, the aftermath could be of eternal self-haunting proportions.
The world is increasingly an impatient place. And that vice – impatience, like pecuniary inclinations, is at the mix of the strife experienced in Nigeria and beyond. Productivity may be a bit on the rise but the system of distribution of the commonwealth is so crooked, it leaves room for agitations and bickering. But men with unrelenting bait for power – some in the mould of the triumvirate in Julius Caesar’s Macbeth also existing these tempestuous times.
Our beloved University of Calabar is in a grip. Daily, the smoke of discord billowing out of that citadel of learning discomforts anyone who has the welfare of that institution at heart. The rise and rise of polarising groups goad the University to the wide path of all that is wrong. We hear of visible ‘we’ versus ‘they’ cabals. And both camps can decree good or bad things to happen. Unfortunately, their open and clandestine actions are in dangerous swing. The glaring manifestation of brigandage attempted arson, disobedience, insubordination in what used to be a posterchild of teaching/research and learning hub in Africa, confirms the downturn of morality and academic pursuit.
I am a witness to the massive divide surging up in UNICAL. Early this year, a respected senior clergy-friend invited me to that institution’s Solemn Assembly. Like the speakers, most of them cleric-docents took turns to say words of exhortation, it became crystal clear that the unseen established protocol was to pan to the perhaps friendly governing camp. So pronounced was the starching of these divisive prayers of “father put confusion in their camp, let them not succeed,” that the officiating priest, The Reverend Father Emmanuel Eroh had to intervene to remind all and sundry that UNICAL is one indivisible entity. This struck me deeply and I confess, it seeded this piece. In admonishing the current leadership to open up the space and embrace its perceived adversaries, he advised those who belong to a different school of thought in terms of attitude towards the constituted authority, to submit to the subsisting leadership of the University. I confirmed that something was indeed amiss. After that programme, I spent a couple of days in Calabar and I did interact with a lot of people. I asked after some prominent members of academia who should have attended that function but didn’t. I learnt that they “stayed away because they aren’t in the same camp as the Vice-Chancellor.” In an academic community? That’s bizarre.
But conflict is a necessary part of man. It is in its resolution that man rises above the cognitive limitations of other species. A year ago, this fifty-year-old University shredded its conservative aprons. A woman was for the first time installed as vice-chancellor. Professor Florence Banku Obi on whose shoulders that icebreaking epaulettes fell is a tested hand. A product of that environment in more ways than one. It was expected then that Madam Vice-Chancellor would have a smooth ride. But no, her leadership strategies and the reforms she is bringing to bear are unsettling many interest groups. I don’t know-how. But I am aware of the massive onslaught against graft and examination malpractice. Yes, UNICAL had become a grade manufacturing and distribution centre. Some lecturers, feeding fat on this, live in many percentages above their salaried means. Tough. But the wheel wound for pretty long, it gave the filthy participants claws. And now those are being sunken in the skin of the reformer.
Public administration is a herculean task. And professors also falter sometimes in this regard. It is pertinent to ask if the authorities gave the dissident officials any ammunition to shoot at them. If fee increase which has become the top issue on the bunsen burner today be blamed for the current threats to the health of that university, it may be great to ask if there was adequate consultation before the new fees were announced. If we needed to raise the fees for hostel accommodation, did we enlighten the students well enough? Sometimes, advocacy even to save public lives is treated with disdain. Ask cigarette smokers and anti-covid vaccine ‘activists’. My thinking is that we should rise above merely communicating with people, we should communicate with them. There is an urgent need to do things a little differently. That is being proactive.
Even those who heckle against positive behavioural change also feel the impact of resisting peaceful change. When lecturers live in mansions and own estates and Porsche cars earned through dirty means, they send to the labour market applicants who do nothing but ruin society. The quality of our work is showing up today in mediocre medical practice, orgy-laden music, cliché-ridden journalism, dirty and blood-stained politics and grand larceny. These are some common indicators of a dying society. UNICAL’s quota to this general Nigerian malfeasance is of an appreciable percentage. We must reverse these ugly gains. The way to go is to reform, reboot and rebrand in a serious manner devoid of exceptions. The VC deserves our support, not antagonism.
Two things I must say, and I believe that the differing opinions would ponder over them. The first is that the University authority should consider its actions and methods. If there are infractions on the part of employees, punishment should be meted, or amnesty offered to personnel who have overtly undermined the University setup. Those who by their actions, such as absence from duty without leave, failing to attend statutory functions or lectures and other similar infractions should be warned accordingly. Bring on discipline. I think they call this the carrot and stick approach. Rather than allow a small crisis to fester because we fear to be labelled, let’s turn things around by letting all know the organogram of the Ivory Tower. A university is a place of research, not a square for hanging obscenities, political deviltry, ethnic and gender biases. Banish ill-will, institute discipline.
As Father Eroh warned at that Assembly, the vice-chancellor must avoid the sweet ego-massaging company of courtesans. In the age of low reward for hard work, many people have gravitated towards the eye service profession and pastime. Such elements who snarl and encircle the orbit of power and authority, demonize others before the governing power just to obtain favours that neither brain nor muscle can bring them. I suspect that this set of characters has unleashed their ominous activities on UNICAL. Tame them, Madam. Treat all who oppose you genuinely and decently as colleagues in progress. Those who convene nocturnal meetings to destroy the school should, if and when caught should be made to face the law. There are levels of crimes that can’t be treated as ‘family affairs’. Pick the carrot, grab a stick and you will clear the Augean’s stable.
Unical looks poised for greatness. We must resist the temptations to mistreat her the way some who administered her in the past did. Those who saw the institution as a private oil well and so sunk their proboscis so deep before leaving her in financial straits must be declared as persona non-gratis. Prudence. Don’t imitate what’s wrong. Teachers’ reward used to be in Heaven. But nowadays, with a decent diversification driven by intellectual polish, the reward can be earned here on earth and in heaven as well. Academics, not the pseudo-intellectuals that occupy the space aren’t supposed to be worshippers of materialism but sowers of all that are good, as reflected in excellence, character and knowledge. If we have these, we are certain to be on the path back to the promised land.
Bankong-Obi, journalist and poet is the author of”The First Shot… Ogoja Province and the Untold Story of The Nigeria/Biafra War. He wrote in from Abuja.