“With our rating by Times Higher Education Impact Rankings as Number 1 University in Nigeria for two consecutive years (2022 & 2023) and Number 221 in the world in 2023, we are already the undisputed champions in education in the country and we must do everything in our powers to always keep the flag flying in the coming years”
By John Odunjo
It was the gathering of stars on Saturday during the 11th unbroken Convocation Ceremony of Afe Babalola University, Ado Ekiti as 1668 students were officially turned out.
Aransiola Grace Oluwadunsi of Agricultural Science Department, who got 4.97 CGPA, emerged the Overall Best Graduating Student among the 1,668 students, made up of 1,459 Bachelor’s and 209 Postgraduate students who were officially turned out.
Also, three distinguished Nigerians – the Emir of Lafia, Justice Sidi Bage, was honoured with Doctor of Law; while former Secretary General of the Commonwealth, Chief Emeka Anyaoku and a businesswoman, Mrs Victoria Samson, were honoured with Doctor of Letters.
ABUAD Founder and Chancellor, Aare Afe Babalola, who bemoaned the multi-dimensional vicissitudes of poor funding, cultism, strike actions and dilapidated infrastructure afflicting public universities in Nigeria, lauded parents of the ABUAD graduates for wise decision.
Babalola said, “First, I would like to thank all our parents for choosing ABUAD as the university for the training, mentorship and guidance of your children into stars ready to conquer the world as confirmed by the testimonies of appreciation we have been receiving from many of our former students.
“We thank you specially for appreciating the value of quality and functional education which we offer in ABUAD and for choosing ABUAD. You will now appreciate that you have gained a lot by sending your children here, a university devoid of strike actions and renowned for its predictable academic calendar. We have not failed you. Their colleagues in other universities are many years behind them. With your continuous cooperation, this university will continue to lead this country in qualitative and functional education”.
Babalola, who congratulated the graduating students on their graduation, however, advised them to “be constantly reminded that the university belongs to you. Your certificate is dear to you and dear to us too. You must always ensure that you do not do anything that brings down the quality of education and the name we have all toiled to build over the years.
“With our rating by Times Higher Education Impact Rankings as Number 1 University in Nigeria for two consecutive years (2022 & 2023) and Number 221 in the world in 2023, we are already the undisputed champions in education in the country and we must do everything in our powers to always keep the flag flying in the coming years”.
The ABUAD founder charged the fresh graduates, “You should study yourselves, know yourselves and continually bear the kernel of the University Anthem which emphasizes the place and import of determination, industry and character in mind at all times.
“You should believe in contentment and be ready to give back to the society. Indeed, you should embrace the belief in giving which is lacking in our society today. You don’t have to be a millionaire or a billionaire before you can give. The little you give could make a lot of difference in the lives of others,” Babalola said.
He, however, suggested to the Federal Government “to revisit the large number of Private Universities it approved in the last few years and ensure conformity with the rules”.
Babalola said, “The only solution to quality education in this country is more of non-profit Private Universities which have residential education where all the students live on campus unlike what obtains in public universities where over 80 per cent of the students live off-campus.
“The question then arises, how do you mentor and monitor students who breeze into the campus around 9am, spend a few hours and go back to their homes by 2pm. Certainly, such students could not have been mentored in learning and character. We should stop deceiving ourselves,”. Afe Babalola said.
In the 2023 Convocation Lecture a day earlier entitled, Management of diversity: A major challenge to governance in pluralistic countries”, former Secretary General of the Commonwealth, Chief Emeka Anyaoku, had said that the way forward for Nigeria was a new constitution to arrest the ongoing deterioration of the situation in the country.
Anyaoku had said that “to achieve the desired transformation for the better, the country needs a system of government that not only addresses Nigeria’s diversity, but is also based on a constitution that can correctly be described as a Nigerian people’s Constitution.
He said, “The essence of the new Constitution should, in recognition of the crucial principle of subsidiarity in every successful federation, involve a devolution of powers from the central government to fewer and more viable federating units with strong provisions for inclusive governance at the centre and in the regions as was agreed by Nigeria’s founding fathers”.
Anyaoku said that Nigeria successfully managed diversity in the early years of independence when “Nigeria’s diversity was perceived by all as a source of strength and inspirer of national unity. But all this changed when the military intervened in the country’s governance in January 1966 and changed the existing constitution”.
According to him, under the Constitution before military intervention, there was security of life and property, and there was a faster pace of economic development in the regions, adding that healthy competition among the regions facilitated rapid development across the country.
He said, “In contrast today, if truth be told, the situation in our country is lamentable. There is unprecedented level of divisiveness and declining sense of national unity, the economy is in doldrums with 133 million of our population in multidimensional poverty.
“There is great insecurity throughout the land as we hear every day of killings and kidnappings by unknown gunmen and marauding bandits, all our infrastructure including power supply, roads and educational and health facilities are in poor state.
“Added to all this, there is complete bastardization of our society ethical values, and an unfathomable level of corruption evident in the often reported massive looting and mismanagement of the country’s resources including the continuing unbridled theft of our crude oil.
Despite these, he, however, said, “I believe that Nigeria is still salvageable. The country can still be restored to greater peace, greater security, to a renewed sense of national unity, to greater political stability, and to a more assured pace of economic development.
“To arrest the ongoing deterioration of the situation in the country, and to achieve the desired transformation for the better, we need a system of government that not only addresses our diversity, but is also based on a Constitution that can correctly be described as a Nigerian people’s Constitution.
“Accordingly, I call on the Presidency in consultation with the National Assembly, instead of continuing to tinker with the 1999 Constitution, to acknowledge the urgent necessity of a new Constitution to be made by the people of Nigeria”.
“To this end, Anyaoku advised the Federal Government to immediately “convene a National Constituent Assembly of directly elected representatives on a non-party basis whose task would be to discuss and agree a new Constitution” taking into account the 1963 and the 1999 Constitutions and the recommendations of the 2014 national conference.
“The Constituent Assembly should be given six months to produce the draft new Constitution. The agreed draft constitution should be put to a national referendum for adoption by a majority of the voters, after which it should be signed by the President,” he said.
Afe Babalola hailed Anyaoku for the lecture which he said was in tandem with his (Babalola’s) calls over the year for a new constitution to address the country’s ills.
Babalola said that Nigerian leaders’ perception of politics as lucrative business rather than service to the people was among things the new constitution would address.
The senior advocate said, “Until we change the constitution, there is no way we can achieve what we ought to achieve.
“With what we are doing here in ABUAD, a new Nigeria is being nurtured. ABUAD is producing special leaders who can change Nigeria. They are contented, reliable, kind and they believe in giving and making things better,” Babalola said.
