By Adebote ‘Seyifunmi
This is a non-fictional story of an advanced secondary school, pardon me, a once-admired university which has not had convocation for her students in the last three years.
Once upon a time, not too long ago, in our dear country — Nigeria, there was an institution admired by parents and teachers for not so many attractive qualities but for the constant academic calendar she possessed; remember that was a long time ago. Her name was University of Agriculture, Abeokuta, now she has a prefix — Federal and for short, we call her FUNAAB.
Few may remember Nimbe Adedipe, he is now an old man, when he was young, he did the best he could to set a strong foundation for the university and passed on the baton, on and on and on; in 2000 and something not too long ago, Professor Olaiya Balogun received the baton in fears and the uncertainty of what would be made of the ivory tower left in his care and five years was all he had- to fail or to repair a failed system.
In summary, Professor Balogun’s performance “ghen-ghened” everyone, even his enemies testified. The detail is no news and the swallowed sweetness is not to be regurgitated here, not today.
The confidence Olaiya Balogun, the noble Professor of Animal Biochemistry had in his successor was highly spiritual; it might have been a revelation of which he had no reservations, except for the abysmal combination of running one of the biggest church in the state along with a much respected 25-year-old university of Agriculture in the country.
Presently, everything is fine, to outsiders and some of ignorant insiders too but the truth is gradually revealed in chains of unfortunate events marring the once enviable beauty of the prestigious university; the impromptu cancellation of a Professors’s inaugural lecture shadowed quickly by the abrupt unannounced postponement of the 23rd and 24th convocation ceremonies scheduled to hold from Friday, 8th to Saturday, 16th July, 2016, the unsettled student union, the oppression on students who cannot find a space to reside in the school cubicle and so take refuge in expensive houses owned by their lecturer, the unavailability of junior lecturers to unburdened the ripened ones, and many others will make you forget that this is a non-fictional story.
So, for want of a better word let’s position all these as ‘unintended unfortunate events’ for want of a better word, I repeat.
Heaping blames on FUNAAB VC, Pastor Olusola Oyewole is not the moral of the story, maybe calling to question Professor Babatunde Idowu, Chairman of Ceremonials Committee will do.
Till now, the school’s website still has on it “We Are Set for Convocation- CERECOM Chairman” in which Professor Idowu boasted arrogantly to the ears of unexcited 2014 and 2015 graduates of FUNAAB’s readiness for the university’s 23rd and 24th combined convocation ceremonies.
June 2015, April 2016 and again, July 2016, this is the third time, the management is taking such unfriendly decision without explanation and the ivory tower is yet to fix a date for the event which is regarded as one of the three most important academic ceremonies.
Though this is few of the many present troubles disquieting the management, it is only polite for the management to make public an explanation as to “Why FUNAAB has not had convocation in 3 years”.
And this is just the beginning of FUNAAB’s non-fictional story.
Adebote ‘Seyifunmi is a youth advocate and media personnel. Follow him on Twitter @adebotes.
