Dr. Tade Oludayo, a lecturer at the University of Ibadan, has exposed the grim reality of public universities in Nigeria.
The don made these declarations in a letter written to President Bola Ahmed Tinubu titled “A letter to President Tinubu on public universities” on Thursday.
He revealed that in many institutions, lecturers were necessited to contribute their own money to get courses accredited by the National Universities Commission (NUC).
This shocking revelation is contained in the letter:
“Mr President, the university system is under attack by the ruling class. Maybe you don’t know or your aides didn’t bring it to your notice. Lecturers are using their blood to sustain the remains of the public university.
“To get courses accredited in many departments in public universities by the National Universities Commission (NUC), lecturers in those departments contribute money to prepare for the accreditation because most of these universities don’t release money or the school administrations have also become nonchalant like their political class counterparts.
“It is very bad in some institutions; door labels/tags are paid for by staff. I had a colleague who brought his generating set to school to power his class because he wanted the students to get some things. After being frustrated by the same system, he resigned and moved to a better place where he is better appreciated for his worth. He would only be coordinating people to earn his living.
“Mr President, as I write, the federal government owes lecturers billions of naira of earned academic allowances for more than six years. If this is not clear to you, it is the money for doing excess teaching and excess supervision. This happened because the federal government refused to recruit more lecturers and ASUU struck a deal that those doing more than they ought to do should be compensated until the government is able to employ more hands.
“Invest in education because those you call developed countries bear that name because of advances in science and technology as a result of their investment in education. Public universities need urgent attention and rescue.”
