ASUU VS FEDERAL GOVERNMENT IMBROGLIO: MY TAKE

It was Aristotle who said 'if education is expensive, try ignorance'. Methinks, we've settled for ignorance as a country, and as a people by our actions and inactions. For over eight months, the doors of our highest citadels of learning have been shut. The significance of this anomalies cannot be understood at the moment.

One thing is cleared: education is not as important to us as we claimed it to be. To the government, there are more serious things to expend money on compared to the education of the citizens. What this means is that the government cannot see the correlation between the productivity of the Nigeria State and the education of the students. And I think, the government may be right in certain regards, but I will come back to this point later. 

To the universities lecturers under the umbrella of ASUU, the lives of the students being wasted is of no concern. Their salaries and emoluments must occupy the pride of place, and who can blame them? Yoruba elders say: 'if fire is burning you and burning your child, the wise thing to do  is to quench the one in your body first, before attempting to quench your child own'. The economy is not smiling, the cost of living is skyrocketing, and standard of living is becoming abysmally low. In the face of this sorry state of national economy, the politicians and people in government are displaying obscene wealth. So the ASUU is hellbent on getting enhanced pay, and improved working conditions. 

And as it is always the case, when two elephants fight, the grass must suffer. So the students are at the mercy of the Federal government and ASUU impasse. At the moment, the students seem to be the one bearing the brunt, but the entire country is going to suffer the loss in the long run. Let's look at some of the immediate and remote impacts of this strike. 

First, the most apparent effect of the strike is suspension of learning and staunted educational growth for the students who supposed to move higher in their educational pursuit. Many students who supposed to have graduated are currently at home doing nothing and remaining  burdens to their parents and guardians. 

Second, there is the loss of skilled manpower to power our economy, assuming there is commensurate relations between what the students learn and the level of competency they are expected to demonstrate on the jobs. Unfortunately, this is not the case. Ask any entrepreneur in the country today, they will tell you that there is dearth of human resources. It is therefore not surprising that many human relations experts in the country will tell you that our unemployment rate is exergerated, as there are jobs but without people with requisite skills to take them up. Sometimes, a vacant position may exists for over three months without a suitable candidate for it. By the time you manage to get people to fill such vacancies, you may be surprised to discover you've employed an entitled person who lacked the capacity to work for his or her  monthly pay. Thus, you are back to square one. 

Thirdly, and consequently, there is loss of productivity resulting in low Gross Domestic Products and Gross National Products for the country. Some weeks ago, the Minister of Finance said Nigeria does not have debt problem but revenue problem'. The aftermath of the strike is that the problem is going to be further compounded. 

Fourthly, more people are going to become more poorer because we've increased dependants who supposed to be contributing to the country GDP and GNP but who are unable to do so because of strike and our sordid educational system. So don't be surprised, if Nigeria move higher in the ladder of poorest countries in the world. 

The question is what is the way out of this quagmire? The easiest thing to say is that government should listen to ASUU and pay them their dues, release the revitalization fund and agree with them on UTAS as against use of IPPIS in the payment of their salaries. I wished it is as easier as it is stated above. First, we need to know the country is broke, though many of us are yet to come to terms with this fact. To many, it is still business as usual. And let's assume the government can even afford what ASUU is demanding for, the question is how sustainable it is?

Without mincing words, it is not sustainable with our present educational arrangement and our consumptive economy system. Tertiary institutions in Nigeria asides country like Norway and Sweden seem to be the most subsidized educational system compared to USA and UK and other Western countries. An undergraduate in Nigeria Federal Universities pay less than thirty thousand as tuition fees for what other students in other climes pay in millions for. The argument is that the parents of the students are also shortchanged in terms of salaries and wages. How do a child of the pepper seller or the clerical officer with thirty thousand minimum wage afford to pay for the school fees of his children if they are to pay like their counterparts? 

Looking back, I remembered how we vehemently rejected the plan to increase our school fees from eleven thousand six hundred naira back then in school. The truth however is that we must choose between quality and quantity, a functional system and a dysfunctional system, the workable system and unworkable system, a realistic system or a-made-believe system. 

MOVING FORWARD

There is need for semi or complete autonomy for our universities and other tertiary institutions. These institutions must be self governing and self financing if we're to move forward as a nation as a people. The continuous grant of subvention to scholars to fund universities, polytechnics and colleges of education is a misnomer that must corrected. To achieve this, government must gradually hands of the management and finance of these institutions. 

What this is means that the institutions should be allowed to charge the students what is enough to keep such institutions running. It can be a twenty years plan, but this must be an agenda that must be set if we're to have a functional system. The question how do the students pay? One quick way is to have a functional students loan system to be paid for a period of ten to twenty years after graduation. Such loan should not be given to the students directly but link to their enrollment in school, payment of tuition fees and purchase of relevant materials while in school. If I were among the policy makers, I will also ensure that academic performance will also to a large extent determine the amount a student is able to borrow over a period of time. By so doing, we will be promoting academic excellence. 

The second way is to encourage genuine academic research as against the present arrangement of copy and paste. We've myriad of problems bedeviling the country that needs to be frontally tackled. Ideally, there is so much contributions tertiary institutions scholars supposed to be making to the nation economy from Agriculture to Medicine, Medicine to Engineering, and Engineering to Health. At present however, there seems not to be a link between the gown and the town, most of our academic researches are of no relevant to the need of the country. 

One major reason for this is a mismatched of our educational curriculums with our nation social, political and  economic realities. If we're to move forward, there is need for us to refashion our educational curriculums to meet the needs of our age, while planning for the future. Another reason is poor quality of our educational system. Not only do we lack functional libraries, teaching materials, and well equipped laboratories, most lectures are equally substandards. 

Some lecturers not only failed to update their knowledge, many are also wont of giving less than what is expected of them. Some will not come for lectures. Some will come to class poorly prepared. In the end, year-in, year-out, poorly taught students graduate from our tertiary institutions. To curb these anomalies, the system needs to have monitoring systems to ensure that lecturers give their best for the pay they're receiving. 

For now, the strike continues and the impacts can only left to be imagined.