REVISITING PROFESSOR CHRIS IMAFIDON'S CLAIM TO OXFORD PROFESSORSHIP
Salimonu Kadiri
Permit me to revisit the claim of Chris Imafidon to being an Oxford Professor. Professor Chris Imafidon, on Thursday, 19 October 2017, delivered the 33rd Convocation Lecture of the University of Ilorin, titled : THE GENIUS IN YOU - NEW TOOLS, TECHNIQUES AND TECHNOLOGY FOR DEVELOPING THE INDIVIDUAL AND INSTITUTIONAL GREATNESS. Professor Chris Imafidon was granted privilege to deliver the lecture because the decision makers at the University of Ilorin were convinced that he is a Professor at the University of Oxford, London. About a month after the lecture, the Punch newspaper in Nigeria claimed it investigated the claim of Professor Chris Imafidon to being a Professor at the University of Oxford and discovered it false, as the authorities at Oxford University and all its affiliated colleges denied any academic relationship with him. The Punch did not confirm if Chris Imafidon is a Professor somewhere else even though not Ocford.
Premised on the Punch newspaper's disclosure, Professor Moses Ebe Ochonu launched an all out attack on University of Ilorin, for allowing itself to be deceived by a dubious Professor in the person of Chris Imafidon. Professor Ochonu's article was posted on this forum by Professor Toyin Falola on Saturday, 16 December 2017 and titled : On Chris Imafidon, Oxford and the government Graft. Referring to the Punch investigative article, Professor Ochonu wrote that it turned out that 'Chris Imafidon is our latest high profile international academic scam artist in the tradition of Philip Emeagwali and Gabriel Oyibo.' On the same day that the aforementioned article was posted, a Professor of Queen's English, Farooq Kperogi, took a free ride on Professor Ochonu's article by posting on this forum what he titled : Remember Enoch Opeyemi Who Claimed to Have Solved Riemann Hypothesis. To Moses and Farooq, Professor Toyin Falola posed a question : If you are not based in Oxford, and you deceive yourself and others to the level of giving a Convocation Lecture, is this not a madness? Professor Falola's question spurred me into thinking that a Professor delivering a convocation lecture must sound like a Professor to his audience, otherwise he or she will risk being exposed to ridicule. A false claim to being a Professor in ordinary public space may be simple but to act or behave as a Professor within a University environment is very difficult. From what we have read so far, neither Professor Ochonu nor the Punch newspaper produced any evidence to show that Chris Imafidon's Convocation Lecture did not measure up to the standard of a Professor. And the way Professor Falola framed his question to Professors Ochonu and Kperogi seemed to indicate that he was not in doubt if Chris Imafidon is a real Professor but doubted if he is based in Oxford. If Chris Imafidon is a Professor somewhere else but not in Oxford as the question raised by Professor Falola would imply, Chris Imafidon would be guilty of fame padding because his claim to be an Oxford Professor which he is not increased his fame more than what it would have been if he had given the correct name of the less famous University in which he is based. Fame padding which is the same as academic padding is not harmful as it was illustrated by the case of a Director at Bazita Sugar Refinery in Kwara State, in 1984.
In 1984, under the military rule of General Muhammadu Buhari, there was a public commission of enquiry pertaining to financial miss-appropriation at the then Bazita Sugar Refinery then in Kwara State. The Director of the Company was accused of claiming to be a PhD holder in Bio-Chemistry by a witness at the enquiry, whereas he possessed just BSc in Bio-Chemistry. The witness informed the Commission that the Director had registered for a PhD course in Bio-Chemistry at the University of Manchester in UK which he did not follow up. Counsel to the Director asked the witness, 'What is the least qualification required to be the Director of the Sugar Refinery?' Witness did not know. Counsel reframed the question, 'Is PhD in Bio-Chemistry required and necessary to be the Director of Bazita Sugar Refinery?' Witness answered no. Counsel asked the witness to tell the commission the significance of the epithets, Alhaji, Bishop, Pastor, Chief, General, Marshall, Doctor and Professor when used singly or collectively by any person as practised in Nigeria. Since the witness kept mute, the counsel asked rhetorically and demanded answer in yes or no, 'Are they not just ordinary titles?' The witness answered, yes. Buhari was overthrown and the report of the enquiry was never made public to the best of my knowledge. The Director of Bazita Sugar Refinery certainly padded his academic qualification but it had no adverse effect on the functions and productions of the Company at that time. Considering the use of epithets in Nigeria, one can see that Nigerians are title-sick which is why they buy, sell, forge, and even rent titles. Most Nigerians do not want to be ordinary persons. They must be great somebody, be important and very important person whether they add important value to the country or not.
I want to argue that we Nigerians may be the most intellectually gullible people on earth. That may be an exaggeration, but we tend to be drawn to bombastic, self-promoting persons and are thus easy prey for fraudulent claimants to academic genius. We also hunger for heroes, making t possible for dubious persons to fulfil that longing for us. ....//.... If according to the scammers, the white man says they are praise-worthy, who are we to object or scrutinize their claim? That is our approach to these men. We cannot conceive of a world in which people and objects purportedly authenticated by the white man should be questioned or verified - Professor Moses Ebe Ochonu.
I strongly object to referring to Chris Imafidon, Philip Emeagwali and Gabriel Oyibo as scammers. To begin with, the University of Ilorin had given a pass mark to the Convocation Lecture delivered by Chris Imafidon. If Professor Ochonu had been present at the Convocation Lecture, he too would have doubtlessly clapped his hands to applaud Chris Imafidon for his Lecture just as those who were present there did. What was really important to the audience was if Imafidon's Lecture was proficiently Professorial or not. As long as the University of Ilorin and the audience were satisfied that Imafidon sounded like a Professor in his Convocation Lecture it will be wrong to refer to him as a scammer not even if he is not a real Professor in Anglo-American sense. In France and Latin countries a teacher is called a Professor!! And for Imafidon to have succeeded in delivering a Convocation Lecture as a Professor without being one, confirmed the saying that the hood does not make a monk.
Talking about white man's authenticated scammers for Nigerians, should it not be right to conclude that all Nigerians in the Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDA) whose academic papers have been authenticated by the white man are scammers since all the MDAs in Nigeria are dysfunctional? Why should any Nigerian castigate the white man as authenticator of scammers in respect of Imafidon, Emeagwali and Oyibo but not when the same white man is the authenticator of Ochonu and Kperogi as Professors? Evidently, neither Imafidon nor Emeagwali or Oyibo holds position in any MDA in Nigeria. Are we not leaving substances and chasing shadows by questioning their academic worth when we should be questioning the genuineness of the academic qualifications of those elected/selected/appointed/employed in the MDAs of Nigeria producing backward economic and industrial developments for the country?
Michael O. Afolayan joined the debate on Thursday, 21 December 2017, and part of his post read, "I also agree with Moses, the self-hate that characterizes our unquenchable appetite for anything foreign has become the tether that ties us to the post of inferiority, imbuing other people's junks and rejecting our own valuables. ....//.... Had Chris Imafidon made the mistake of claiming to be a graduate of a Nigerian University, he would have become a laughing stock from Day One of his jolly ride."
In the Nigerian context, unquenchable appetite for anything foreign implies everything from the white man. Dr. Afolayan, like all educated Nigerians, is sitting on a stem of a tree planted by the White man. If he thinks the tree does not serve the interest of Nigeria, he cannot sit tight on the stem of the White man's tree and at the same time pretend cutting it down. The wisest thing to do is to climb down from the neo-colonial White man's tree and uproot it since it does not serve the interest of Nigerians. He cannot pretend to having no appetite for the White man's neo-colonial tree while at the same time sitting comfortably on its stem. The language of governance in Nigeria, English, is white man's and foreign. Over 98% of Nigerians cannot read, write or speak English properly. Our Universities are modelled after English and American systems which are foreign. If the Convocation Lecture at the University of Ilorin had been delivered by a Nigerian-based Professor instead of the supposedly Oxford-based Professor, it would not have turned the delivered Lecture into indigenous one, as Dr. Michael Afolayan seemed to suggest. This is because the institution is foreign and the language of expression at the Lecture, English, is white. The truth which Western educated Nigerians never want to admit is that the political, educational, economic and judicial systems in Nigeria are subordinate to the U.S. and European Union. Despite that a national flag and a national anthem was conceded to Nigeria in 1960, we are still controlled by the white world. How is that possible?
When Nigeria was granted self-administered enslavement, the rank of leaders of our government was that of slave overseers. Of course, when white men departed Nigeria, Western educated Nigerians took over their jobs, inherited their rates of pay and their privileges, played their roles and assumed their attitudes towards ordinary Nigerians. Chinua Achebe narrated what happened when British left government ministries, public and privately held firms, corporations, organizations, and schools in Nigeria after October 1, 1960. He wrote, "... a number of internal jobs, especially the senior management positions, began to open up for Nigerians, particularly for those with a university education. It was into these positions vacated by the British that a number of people like myself were placed. ...//... This bequest was much greater than just stepping into jobs left behind by the British. Members of my generation also moved into homes in the former British quarters previously occupied by members of the European senior civil servant. These homes often came with servants - chauffeurs, maids, cooks, gardeners, stewards - whom the British had organized meticulously to ease their colonial sojourn. Now following the departure of the Europeans, many domestic staff stayed in the same positions and were only too grateful to continue their designated salaried roles in post-independence Nigeria. Their masters were no longer European but their brothers and sisters." (p. 48-9, There Was a Country).
What Chinua Achebe failed to note is that Nigerians who stepped into the jobbs left by the British in Nigeria were serving the interest of the British people in the same manner as the departed British officials. The Yoruba people who observed the life-styles of the new Nigerian officials that replaced the British, euphemistically referred to them as, ÒYÌNBÓ ALÁWÒ DÚDÚ meaning WHITE MAN WITH BLACK SKIN. Right from the beginning, acquisition of Western education was introduced to Nigerians as means of enjoying white man's standard of living without labour because the concept of work, as we were indoctrinated, is associated with suffering, punishment and unsuccessful life. Initially, the MDAs could absorb all educated Nigerians into the bureaucracy which soon became congested as more Nigerians acquired white man's education in order to escape working for their livings. Consequently, ethnicity and religion became tools of competition to gain admission into the club of White man with black skin. The throat-cutting competitions for position in offices led to the insertion of 'Federal Character' into the Constitution of Nigeria which guaranteed appointment or employment to individuals regardless of competence and ability to perform in office. Thus, when the white world typecast the Blacks in general as unintelligent and inferior to the whites, it is not because of the colour of the skin alone, as Richard J. Herrnstein and Charles Murray had indicated in their book, THE BELL CURVE, but because the Black man has refused to be the master of his environment and manager of his endowed natural resources of which Nigerians are typical example. The tether that ties us to the post of inferiority is, therefore, not our appetite for anything foreign, as Dr. Michael Afolayan stated, but our ignorant belief that Western Europeans that carted us to America and West Indies as slaves and later partitioned Africa into their colonies at the Berlin Conference of 1884-1885, had set us free and the colonisers are now treating us as their equals. The reason why we were colonised as it was historically recorded was never philanthropic.
Supporting Italy's invasion of Abyssinia (now Ethiopia) in 1935, Sir Arthur Willert wrote, "Italy must expand. She came late into the world as a Great Power and found that the good parts of the earth had already been apportioned between luckier countries. She cannot with her rapidly growing population, now in the neighbourhood of 45, 000, 000 (45 million) remain forever cooped up in her peninsula with its large tracts of barren mountains and its lack of essential raw materials (p. 206, The Frontiers of England by Sir Arthur Willert)." And where was Italy going to get raw materials and food to feed her rapidly growing population? Sir Arthur Willert answered that question on page 211 of his book thus, "Italy, in going for the Abyssinians (Ethiopians), is fighting on behalf of Europe. Europe is losing Asia; the Western Hemisphere is full up. So, of the great spaces of the world from which a short time ago her countries (European countries) could draw cheap supplies of food and raw material, only Africa remains. If Europe loses this last reservoir, it is done, it will shrink to nothing. Hence the Africans must be kept down."
Wailing over lack of food and raw material in the German Reichstag (Parliament), on 20 February 1938, Chancellor Adolf Hitler said among other things, "Our economic position is a difficult one, not because National-Socialism is at the helm, because 140 people must live on a square kilometre; because we are not in possession of those great, natural resources enjoyed by other people; because, above all we have a scarcity of fertile soil. If Great Britain should suddenly dissolve today and England become dependent solely on her own territory, then the people there would perhaps have more understanding of the seriousness of economic tasks which confront us (p.63, note 1, PEACE WITH THE DICTATORS By Sir Norman Angell)." Continuing on page 64, Adolf complained about the impossibility of feeding 140 people to a square kilometre without colonial rounding-off. Therefore, he concluded, "No matter what we may achieve by increasing the German production, all this cannot remove the impossible nature of the space allotted to Germany. The claim for German colonial possessions will, therefore, be voiced from year to year with increasing vigour, possessions which Germany did not take away from other countries ........ but appear indispensable for our own people." German colonial possessions which Hitler intended claiming with vigour so as to provide food and raw materials for the hungry Germans were South West Africa (now Namibia), Tanganyika (now Tanzania) Cameroon and Togo seized from Germany as a result of World War I. The total landmass area of those countries together is 2, 298,731square kilometres, compared to Germany with a landmass area of 357,041 square kilometres. Germany's natural resources barren and unfertile soil remain the same till date just as it is with Italy, France, Belgium, Britain, Spain, Portugal and other Western European countries. That was why Africa was colonised and the reason for colonialization of Africa remains the same although colonialization is self-administered nowadays by African indigenes as we have in Nigeria. The self-administered colonialism makes it possible for Nigeria to export crude oil to Italy, Germany and other countries in Europe where it is refined into various products for their citizens to consume, whereas Nigerians must sleep at fuel stations to buy petrol. The dysfunctional Nigeria's crude oil refineries are not manned by Imafidon, Opeyemi, Emeagwali or Oyibo but by qualified academic degree holders both from home and foreign Universities. If the academic degrees of managers of Nigeria's oil refineries are not fake, why are the crude oil refineries in permanent coma?
Professor Moses Ochonu's article titled, On Chris Imafidon, Oxford and Government Graft, did not receive so much comments as Professor Farooq Kperogi's, Remember Enoch Opeyemi who claimed to have solved the Riemann Hypothesis. In his reaction to the said article, Victor Okafor addressed two questions to Professor Kperogi, (1) Have you taken any step to find out from the Clay Mathematics Institute why and how it determined that Dr. Enoch Opeyemi's claim was false, inadequate or inaccurate? (2) What are the specific steps by which that institute arrived at its judgment, if any, that Dr, Opeyemi was merely fantasizing? These reasonable questions deserved answers in view of the claim by Professor Farooq Kperogi that after two years, he checked Clay Mathematics Institute, and the Riemann Hypothesis that Opeyemi claimed to have solved two years ago is still listed as unsolved. Surprisingly, Professor Farooq Kperogi completely ignored the intelligent questions raised by Victor Okafor. Instead, he resorted to childish display of unimportant knowledge with minute observance of petty rules and details of grammatical blunders committed by a commentator who, however, supported his views on Opeyemi. Sometimes, we write in haste and hurriedly post comments without reading to check for possible mistakes. Normal intellectuals, not braggadocios, always ignore such mistakes as long as they do not distort the sense in the conveyed message. Dr. Enoch Opeyemi, a mathematics lecturer at the Federal University of Oye-Ekiti, Nigeria, submitted papers to the US-based Clay Mathematics Institute claiming that he had solved the 156-year-old Riemann Hypothesis. After receiving Opeyemi's papers, Clay Mathematics Institute is obliged to publicly reject or accept his solution as contained in the submitted papers. Silence by the US-based Clay Mathematics Institute can only imply that Dr. Enoch Opeyemi actually solved the Riemann Hypothesis but the all white- dominated jury of the Institute are unwilling to accord recognition to the black man, Dr. Opeyemi, for solving the mathematical hypothesis in question. Dr. Opeyemi did not submit his papers to a PhD student for evaluation and decision but to Clay Mathematics Institute. The tragedy here, therefore, is not that a Ku Klux Klan PhD student is allowed to determine the veracity of Dr. Opeyemi's papers, as Professor Kperogi jubilantly stated, but his inability to see the racist and despiteful attitude of the authorities at the US-based Clay Mathematics Institute to Dr. Opeyemi who kept silent, over his professed solution to the Riemann Hypothesis, whether right or wrong. In the fields of Mathematics, Science and Technology, a white man will never accord a black man due honour for any new invention or discovery. The usual thing is for the white man to accept the black man's papers and make it his own. At best, the name of the black man may appear at the rear of the paper and introduced as a collaborator. Appropriation of others inventions or discoveries is not uncommon even between whites as the discovery of the AIDS virus in the 1980s proved. For the sake of the unsuspecting, let me recall that incident.
Dr. Robert Gallo of the US National Cancer Institute would have succeeded in appropriating to himself the discovery of the AIDS virus, if Dr. Luc Montagnier of the French Pasteur Institute, Paris, had been a black man or a Nigerian as Dr. Enoch Opeyemi. It was so that Dr. Luc Montagnier and colleagues at Pasteur Institute had succeeded in isolating a virus from the Lymph node of a homosexual patient in 1983 and had their result published in the Journal, Science of 20 May 1983. They named the isolated virus, Lymphadenopathy- Associated Virus (LAV). However, Dr. Robert Gallo claimed that LAV was a family member of his own virus named Human T-cell Leukaemia Virus-1 (HTLV-I). Montagnier disagreed and sent an isolate of LAV to Dr. Gallo on 23 September 1983, to help establish that LAV was not related to HTLV-I but a distinct virus. Pasteur Institute filed for a British and a US patent for blood test in September and December 1983, respectively. Suddenly, on 23 April 1984, Dr. Gallo appeared at a press conference in the company of the US Secretary of Health and Human Services, Margaret Heckler where the latter announced that American Scientists (Gallo and his Team) had discovered probable cause of AIDS. On the same day, the American government filed for AIDS testing kits patent. Gallo's AIDS virus discovery was published in the Science of 4 May 1984 with the photographs of the new virus, named Human T-cell Leukaemia Virus -Three (HTLV-III). It was subsequently discovered that Gallo's HTLV-III AIDS virus was identical to LAV isolate which Montagnier had sent to him on 23 September 1983. On 28 May 1985 the US Patent and Trademark Office awarded Gallo a patent on blood test kits but remained silent on Montagnier's application that preceded that of Gallo by nine months. Therefore, the Pasteur Institute filed a lawsuit at a US federal high court accusing National Cancer Institute of theft of the virus, LAV. In view of the political and commercial potentials of AIDS disease, President Ronald Regan of the US and President Jacques Chirac of France met in 1987 and agreed to out of court settlement, whereby Dr. Gallo was designated co-discoverer of the AIDS virus with Dr. Montagnier and royalties on blood test were to be shared equally between the warring AIDS combatants. A new name, Human Immunodeficiency Virus with the acronym, HIV, replaced LAV and HTLV-III. (see AIDS: THE HIV MYTH BY JAD ADAMS as well as AND THE BAND PLAYED ON BY RANDY SHILTS). Who actually discovered what today is known as HIV was finally settled in 2008 when the Nobel Price for the discovery was awarded to Dr. Luc Montagnier and his French colleague, Dr Francoise Barré-Sinoussi. The Nobel Price Committee explained that HIV was discovered in 1983 and not 1984!! If conflict could occur between a white French and a white American over who discovered HIV, I leave the rest to the imagination of readers to guess what could have happened when a black Nigerian, Dr. Enoch Opeyemi, submitted his papers on the solution of Riemann Hypothesis to the white American owned Clay Mathematics Institute.
Finally, I am not holding brief for Dr. Enoch Opeyemi or any of those accused of fake or fraudulent academic claims. Since Western education has not contributed to the growth of economy in Nigeria industrially through advances in medicine, science and technology, should it not be admitted that all Nigerian officials with academic qualifications that have failed the country are also fake or fraudulent academics? In the Nigeria Handbook of 1970, it was stated that mineral resources of the country consist of Limestone, Petroleum Oil and Gas, Tin and Colum-bite, Iron Ore, Lead-Zinc, Gold, Marble, Stone, Zircon, Coal and Lignite. Nigeria has 74 million hectares of arable land and 2.5 million hectares of irrigation land. The rainforest in the South contains different species of Timber. In May 1970, THE NIGERIAN COUNCIL FOR SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY was inaugurated by the Military Head of State, General Yakubu Gowon. Three of the objectives of the Nigerian Council for Science and Technology as stated on page one of its inaugural brochure were (a) to determine priorities for scientific activities in the Federation in relation to the economic and social policies of the country and its international commitments, (c) to ensure the application of the results of scientific activities to the development of agriculture, industry and social welfare in the Federation, (d) to ensure co-operation and co-ordination between the various agencies involved in the machinery for making the national science policy. Further on page 2, it is stated that the functions of the Council shall, among others, be (a) to consider and advise generally on all scientific activities, including (i) the application of the results of research, (ii) the transfer of technology into agriculture and industry. The thirty-five members of the Council consisted of eleven Federal Permanent Secretaries from Ministries of, Agriculture and Natural Resources, Communications, Economic Development and Reconstruction, Education, Finance, Health, Industries, Mines and Power, Trade, and Transport. Each of the then twelve states was represented by a person with, at least, an academic degree of B.Sc. while twelve representatives of science disciplines in Agricultural, Experimental, Industrial, Medical, Environmental and Social Sciences were also members. In his inaugural address to members, Major-General Yakubu Gowon said, "Nigeria is endowed with immense natural resources, which, if properly developed through the application of science and technology, would ensure for the present and future generations (of Nigeria) a bright economic future." Almost forty-eight years after the inauguration of the Nigerian Council For Science And Technology, Nigeria's herdsmen still traverse several hundred kilometres within the country to graze their cattle, a burden which some professors regard as herdsmen's fundamental human right worth defending. Our Agricultural system is still sustained by farmers primitively equipped with cutlasses and hoes. Crude oil we cannot refine; potable water we cannot pump; electricity we cannot generate and distribute; iron ore we cannot mine and work into steel; and our hospitals have been reduced to morgues while our leaders and officials run to the white man, from whom they claimed we have been liberated, to receive treatments. All Ministries, Departments and Agencies created to produce goods and services are manned by Nigerians whose academic degrees have certified them as capable of producing what are required from their respective office. Their failures in office can only mean that their academic degrees are fake and that is why Nigeria is poor and underdeveloped. While our Nigerian English Language Fundamentalists are blowing their grammars, the Dutch speaking Julius Berger is building Houses and Bridges and constructing roads for Nigeria, just as not so good English speaking Chinese are laying rail tracks for Nigeria. In fact there is need to write a book titled: HOW EDUCATED NIGERIANS ARE UNDERDEVELOPING NIGERIA AND IMPOVERISHING HER CITIZENS.
S. Kadiri
Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju
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Emeagwali, Gloria (History)
"........but to reach the level of standardization, disciplinary coherence, epistemic rigour and distillation of global knowledge often within institutional contexts, represented by Western education is no small achievement." Adepoju
You are truly mesmerized by the West. I hope that systematic euro - propaganda has not taken its toll.
I wonder why you assume that some of the features listed above are exclusively western.
We had a similar discussion a few months ago in terms of the origins of the book. I pointed out then that the
printed book as we know it has strong roots in Nubian-Egyptian, Chinese and Tibetan history, citing Nile Papyrus scrolls,
Buddhist monks and Chinese printing technology - long before Gotenberg and others.
I can give you examples of standardization, epistemic rigor and disciplinary coherence that pre-date the West. Do not assume that Knowledge around the globe had no intellectual rigor, logic and standards of its own.
There were also additional criteria, depending on the culture and context, that would be quite difficult for today's "westerner." For example memory and memorization counted for much in some cultures. Many of today's researchers would flunk that test. Incidentally, contemporary science indicates that memorization actually develops the brain. The prioritization of some criteria and variables, over others, also took place.
One of the major examples of the distillation of global knowledge actually dates to an era of Islamic dominance, when knowledge of a certain kind was transmitted through the Silk Road and an interlocking commercial route, aided by Mongol military and political dominance - to give one example. Civilizations and cultures before the rise of western dominance also contributed to global knowledge.
Your argument covertly/indirectly implies that before or without the West, there was not much worthwhile. Turn this around.
I don't know if you are trying to belittle or trivialize the contributions of Ake and Falola in your reference. In any case, their intellectual profile and epistemological constructs are not identical. In some ways, though not all, they are actually anti-western - navigating through the perilous system, channels and tunnels to get to the other side of the lion's den.They defied Western expectations. Like the anti - colonial activists of the 40s, 50s and 60s they used certain existing paraphernalia to achieve their goals to suit the occasion and context of their situation.
Falola is a master of knowledge production and an institutional builder and scholar.
Ake was cut down in his prime during/by the Babangida regime leaving us a distinct methodology in his works, all the same.
Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju
To what degree is the following characterization by Gloria true of Falola and Ake:
"navigating through the perilous system, channels and tunnels to get to the other side of the lion's den.They defied Western expectations. Like the anti - colonial activists of the 40s, 50s and 60s they used certain existing paraphernalia to achieve their goals to suit the occasion and context of their situation".
Even if Falola began his career in the days of 'there is no African history or historiography' of the Hugh-Trevor Roper days, which I don't think he did, that ground already having been broken by his predecessors in the Ibadan History School, he thrived from the very beginning of his career in the Western academy represented by his PhD and subsequent lecturing at Nigeria's OAU, where he published at least two books a year from the award of the PhD. From my understanding of his career, he has never lacked recognition for his achievements. Same with Claude Ake. Part of the beauty of the Western system is its dynamism, even if slow in race centred issues. But perhaps Gloria has facts about the scholars in question to which I dont have access.
Cornelius Hamelberg
Baba Kadiri,
This should interest thee and other discussants : What's a 'professor'? – TheTLS
“When Nigeria was granted self-administered enslavement…” ?
How can any self-respecting African talk like that, even in derision, like a bitter old Negro?
3. Listen well, well, well : as Fela put it, “Na White man teach Africans to carry shit”
And lest we forget, and fail to bear it in mind at all times, Daniel O. Fagunwa & Yoruba writers & Ngugi with all of his crew notwithstanding, for your edification, with the spread of Western Civilisation, the rise and supremacy of Her Majesty the Queen’s English Language Empire…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rV89ldxaVlg
Emeagwali, Gloria (History)
"Falola and Ake are not anti-Western. They are critics of particular inadequacies of the Western academy as well as of negative aspects of the Western socio-economic system. That is not the same as being anti-Western."Adepoju
Correction noted, although I qualified the statement.
However you have articulated the point more clearly than I did.
History Department
Sent: Thursday, January 11, 2018 9:25 PM
To: usaafricadialogue
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - REVISITING PROFESSOR CHRIS IMAFIDON'S CLAIM TO OXFORD PROFESSORSHIP
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Salimonu Kadiri
Along similar lines, Kadiri has earlier on this group identified with Boko Haram Islamic terrorism, projecting the group's denigration of Western education, downplaying their massacres across the North with expressions as 'Boko Haram may have killed' and struggling to deny the group's use of murder of Islamic clerics who disagree with their short sighted ideology as central to their campaign, valorising the group's beginnings as a communal system in Borno - Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju - under the subtitle : The Paradox of the Relationship Between Boko Haram Islamic Terrorism and Western Education.
If you have quoted from what I wrote instead of summarily interpreting it to suit your malicious intention, your readers would have been saved the pain of false information. Historically, there arose an Islamic religious sect in Borno State, in 2002, named Jama'atu Ahlis Sunna Lidda'awati Wal-Jihad, translated as People Committed to the Propagation of the Prophet's Teachings and Jihad. Between 2004 and 2009, they grew into a large movement when they started farm projects and provided employment for their members, provided welfare for disabled members, trained people to work, and provided alternative to the government of the day. The Governor of the State then, Ali Modu Sheriff, appointed an influential member of the movement, Alhaji Buju Foi, as Borno State Commissioner for Religious Affairs in 2007, with a calculated intention of corrupting the sect.
In February 2009, the government of Ali Modu Sheriff banned riding motor-bike without wearing helmets at the time the Islamic sect was engaged in commercial motor-bike transportation. Five months later, a prominent member of the sect died, and a large member of them, on motor-bike entourage, were on their way to bury him. Police stopped them for lack of helmets on their heads. In the ensuing rowdiness, Police shot and wounded many of them. The sect re-grouped, attacked and killed Police in Bauchi, Borno and Yobe States. The sect took control of Maiduguri, the capital of Borno State, for three days before the Army was called in to restore order. The army regained control of Maiduguri and arrested their leader, Mohammed Yusuf, along with many members of his sect who were handed over to the Police. Mohammed Yusuf died under questionable circumstance in police custody. The Commissioner of religious affairs, Buji Foi, was shot in the back as online video testified. Thereafter, the sect resorted to violent attacks on the authorities at large, during the era of President Yar'Adua. That was what I narrated.
Since I do not speak Hausa or Fulfudi as Fulani language is called, I enquired from forum members not only about the origin of the name Boko Haram but if its translation into English language is : Western Education is a sin, or is Forbidden or is an abomination, as they have interchangeably been used in the media. It is a well known fact that the word haram implies sin, or forbid or abomination, but Western Education cannot be compounded to a single Hausa/Fulani word, BOKO. My question to you and others, is who invented the name Boko Haram and translated it to Western Education is sin? Is it not possible that the original sect, JAMA'ATU AHLIS SUNNA LIDDA'AWATI WAL-JIHAD, had been hijacked by other forces with different ideology and purpose? If Boko Haram implies Western Education is a sin, then their fighters would not have been using western weapons, ammunition and communication gargets. Another fact is that the leaders of Boko Haram, Abubakar Shekau, and Abu Mahjin, are French speaking citizens from Niger and Chad Republic respectively. Is France, with its strong military presence in Niger and Chad Republics not seeking a type of Bakasi concession from Nigeria in the Chad Basin since the geological survey of the area revealed oil and Uranium deposits? Yes, Mr. Adepoju, I stated that Boko Haram as presented by the media to us might have killed innocent people but they are less terrible when compared with many of Nigeria's ostensible academic officials whose greed and theft of public funds have caused far more misery and deaths among Nigerians.
You think that I am denigrating Western Education but that is untrue. I have in my previous post asserted that if it were true that the slogan of Boko Haram is Western Education is sin, or forbidden, or is an abomination, they would have been telling the truth if, instead, they had said that Western education is useless in Nigeria. When Obasanjo became President in 1999, he approached his American friends, former President Jimmy Carter and former US representative at the UN, Andrew Young, to help him recruit Americans to invest in the industrial development of Nigeria. Andrew Young and Jimmy Carter told Obasanjo that there were thousands of qualified Nigerians, in economics, science and technology, living and working in the USA. With the natural resources at the disposal of Nigeria, Andrew Young and Jimmy Carter counselled Obasanjo to attract educated Nigerians to return home and invest their knowledge in the country. That was how the Nigerian In Diaspora Organisation (NIDO) started and some Diasporans were employed by Obasanjo with no tangible result. Whether Obasanjo, Yar'Adua or Jonathan, the MDA's in Nigeria are peopled by Western Educated officials certified as capable of performing like their counterparts in Western Europe who, evidently are dependent on imported raw materials from our country. Western educated Nigerians in our MDAs cannot, generate and distribute electricity, pump potable water, mine iron ore and work it into steel, refine crude oil, construct motor-able roads, and etc., even though they have been certified (or is it authenticated?) as experts by the white man in their respective fields. The white man would appear to have threaded the fur of lions on goats for us and we expect the goats to prey on antelopes. Thus, when we talk about fake or fraudulent academic claims by Nigerians, we should extend it to those who manned the MDAs in Nigeria, since they have failed to produce in office according to their acclaimed academic degrees.
Elsewhere, in response to Mr. Bewaji, Mr. Adepoju, was still maintaining that Chris Imafidon is not a Professor at Oxford. And so what? With the exception of media gossip from the Punch, no one has proved that Chris Imafidon is not an Oxford Professor or is not a Professor at all. The evidence before us is that Chris Imafidon delivered a Convocation Lecture as a Professor and his audience were satisfied that they listened to a Professor, regardless of where he is based. There is no way by which the audience at University of Ilorin could differentiate how Professors from various universities in the world would lecture. Therefore, whether Chris Imafidon is an Oxford Professor or not is unessential to the University of Ilorin that had engaged him to deliver its 33rd Convocation Lecture as long as he was professorial, in content and purpose, in his address. It is just like saying fowls are toothless, yet they eat corns and sip it down with water. Do those with teeth eat stone? You say Chris Imafidon is not an Oxford Professor, but he was applauded after delivering a Convocation Lecture by his listeners. Tell us what an Oxford Professor would have said that Chris Imafidon did not say?
You said that Philip Emeagwali and Gabriel Oyibo have thoroughly been investigated. My question to you is, who investigated them and why? Did anyone or Nigeria, as a country, suffer any damage from their claims? Furthermore, you informed us that Abdulraufu Mustapha and Wale Adebanwi are Professors in Oxford and Cambridge respectively. You said further that there are other Black academics at Harvard with a number of Nigerian Professors as well as at other Universities across the world. What impacts have those Nigerian Professors had on social, economic and industrial developments of Nigeria? Is education a personal ego-boosting chauvinism? In Europe and America, educational opportunity is used to organise, enlighten and emancipate citizens from lack of knowledge, hopelessness, shackles of poverty and diseases. Nigerian academics in Europe and America are certainly involved in practical application of education to effect social, economic and industrial developments there, but their failure to replicate the same in Nigeria is what makes them labourers. A labourer, for instance, is a person who builds houses for others but has no house of his own.
As for Opeyemi, I wonder if those examining his story have taken their investigations to a conclusion - Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju.
Dr. Enoch Opeyemi is a lecturer in mathematics. He submitted papers to the US-based Clay Mathematics Institute, claiming to have solved Riemann's Hypothesis. It is the Institute which is qualified to accept or reject his papers. If Dr. Opeyemi had gone public to claim that he had solved Riemann's Hypothesis without submitting any paper to US-based Clay Mathematics Institute, it would be right to accuse him of fraudulent claim. That Dr.Opeyemi actually submitted his papers on what he believed to be the solution to Riemann Hypothesis was indirectly confirmed by Professor Farooq Kperogi when he wrote that a PhD student tore Opeyemi's solution into pieces. If there is a boil on the face of a fox, a fowl is not qualified to point at it. And whether Dr. Enoch Opeyemi succeeded to solve Riemann Hypothesis in the papers he submitted to the US-based Clay Mathematics Institute or not, a Professor of Queen's English is not competent to evaluate his papers, not even if the Professor by birth is the son of Queen of England.
S. Kadiri
Skickat: den 11 januari 2018 08:23
Till: usaafricadialogue
Ämne: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - REVISITING PROFESSOR CHRIS IMAFIDON'S CLAIM TO OXFORD PROFESSORSHIP
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Salimonu Kadiri
Thank you my only trusted African Rabbi. Fela had another LP song titled, NO BREAD. He sang - Look well-well; You stand for ground, your leg de shake; Na your leg weak, ground e no de shake; Hungry e de show im power; You no get power to fight, no Buredi; O mother; For Africa here e be home, no buredi; Land boku for forest so te, no buredi; Gold de for ground like water, no buredi; Diamond de for ground like sand-sand, no buredi; Oil de flow for underground like river, no buredi; EVERYTHING FOR OVERSEA NA FROM HERE E DE GO; no buredi; NA FOR HERE MAN STILL DE CARRY SHIT FOR HEAD, no buredi;.....
May his soul rest in peace.
S. Kadiri
Skickat: den 12 januari 2018 10:39
Till: USA Africa Dialogue Series
Ämne: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Re: REVISITING PROFESSOR CHRIS IMAFIDON'S CLAIM TO OXFORD PROFESSORSHIP
Kayode J. Fakinlede
I sympathise with some of the issues raised by Mr. Kadri in this article. However, I take exception with the issue of the lack of performance of our Western educated Nigerians or Nigerians who have attended universities and obtained high degrees.
Having worked in American industries in various capacities for at least thirty years and in the industrial sector for close to four decades, I am in position to evaluate the issues bedeviling the industrial sector and the technological sector in Nigeria as a whole
The simple fact is that the European and by a logical extension, Americans have been building economies based on technology for at least two millenia. The modern industrial sector in America started with the arrival of the Europeans on American soil.
A graduate from an American university or even from any country living in America, is not being asked to generate and distribute electricity for a country of asked to manufacture even a pin. He is merely a cog and a minusule one in the wheel of an already smooth running electricity company, if he is employed there, or for that matter a supervsor in a company where pins are manufactured. That is the reason why, Nigerian graduates, coming to America, are able to fit effortlessly into the technologically advanced system.
“What can you do?” The employement agent asked me many years ago on my arrival to America. He wanted to know what I was qualified to do. I had only a certificate telling him that I was eminently educated. However, he wanted to know if I could type, drive, operate a forklift, or something. I was not qualified for anything in the technologically built economic system. I was therefore thrown into the lowest rung of the economic ladder – as a messenger.
Granted, I quickly climbed my way out of that position by taking advantage of the training and education system, I could imagine a Nigerian graduate from a Nigerian university being asked to go run a petroleum company or even manufacture a car. He does not have the qualification AND he does not exist within an economic system that would make gaining the experience possible. There is simply no technologically constructed economic system yet.
Now, Is that the reason why he cannot manufacture even a pin? Sadly, that is the reason. The technology involved in manufacturing a pin is not much far removed from that involved in manyfacturing a large airliner.
The process in achieveing a technologically oriented economy lies not in castigating our graduates. While teaching in a Nigerian technological university, I was able to empathize with many of our students and their lecturers. While these people do not lack in intelligence, they are definitely not equipped to become masters of industry. I also know that this is not just a case of importing the most modern equipment to teach the students. The simple fact is that there is no support system to make things happen yet.
We are most quick as Nigerians to blame things on government. Yes, our governments are much culpable in our development technologically. But their culpabilitity stems more from ignorance than wilfull malice. They simply do not know what to do.
African economies today are faced with more than a double whammy. The budding middle class, whom they managed to educate with meager resources are, like moths that are attracted by light, departing the continent in droves to the already built economies. And for most, there is no turning back. They can sympathize, empathize or ‘feel’ for their countries of origin, there is however nothing that can replace their actual presence in their countries, helping in the building of the economy. This understandably is a difficult proposition for most who have managed to escape the harsh realities of living in Africa.
Nevertheless, from now, it is incumbent on all of us to begin to figure out how we can develop our individual countries.The issue of perpetual analysis often lead to paralysis, considering the myriads of issues definable.
Enough of sending money home to build palaces that we will never live in but which are mainly aimed at stoking our egos. Enough of incessant analysis. We are beginning to speak English, French, Spanish etc. better that their native speakers. We compete and glorify on irrelevancies
Our main question, going forward must be ‘HOW CAN I HELP IN MY AREA OF INTEREST?’ That area is then defined by us and we start working at it. That is how the Europeans and Americans built the aforementioned technologially, industrially sophisticated economies we gravitate towards.
As a conclusion, I must confess, we talk too much!!
Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju
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Kayode J. Fakinlede
Please, please, please. I have not said it would take us two thousand years to build a technology driven economy. That the Europeans have been building it for the past two millenia means that they learned how to build one more than two thousand years ago and have been using their knowledge to build it since then. And reaping the profits thereof.
The main question therefore is how long does it take to learn to become a technology driven economy and whose responsibility is it to learn this exremely complex subject matter?
Before I answer these questions, let me start by blowing Mr. Kadiri’s mind by saying categorically that the place of an engineer, technologist, etc. in buildng this kind of ecnomy is extremely overated but really limited. The Pharaos who built the great pyramids and the great Ceasers who built the coliseum, structures that have been around in excess of the aforementioned two millenia were neither reputed to be great engineers nor technologists. Let us therefore not generate any measure of conniption about the expert level of our engineers.
Now, the answers to these question have been couched in the second last paragraph of my initial wrtite up. However, I will need to break it down even further with the hope that I can make myself understood.
A technologically driven economy is constitued of little things called projects. A project is an enterprise planned to achieve a particular aim. This means that a project must be thought of, planned, financed, executed, and completed in order to achieve the desired objective. Now whoever is dreaming of this project; planning its execution; looking for means of achieving it; what measure of incentive he puts into it; how much he is willing to see it to completion etc. is the project owner. You see this term used very frequently in American schools – I mean from elementary schools to higher institutions. Every child or student is frequently given a project and told to complete it within a certain time frame.
What kinds of project therefore are we talking about? Projects come in various sizes, ways and dimensions. It may range from as little as buying books for an elementary school; digging a borehole or a well in a community to building a large aircraft or constructing a major highway. All of these follow the same pattern of execution.
Now, who can own a project? This is where, to me, the greatest misconception comes from as far as whether a society is technologically driven or not. Anyone person, institution, society, government, can be a project owner. And the more people within a community participate in the ownership of projects, the more technologically developed the community will be. This is the first law of the technologically driven economy. This is where the rubber meets the road. This is where we, Africans seem to drop the ball. As long as we have it in our minds that it is the responsibility of governments only to own projects, we will not become a technologically driven society. This is the second law. That is, the more we rely on governments to own projects, the less technologically driven we will be. The corollary to this law says that the more a person thinks it is the responsibility of the other person to own a project, the less his community will be developed.
It is now incumbent on me to set the record straight as to how a project is executed. Stay tuned.
Salimonu Kadiri
Mr. Kayode J. Fakinlede, this discourse originated from the expressed anger of some of our learned Professors over what they assumed to be false claim to academic achievements by certain named Nigerians. These supposedly false claimants to academic achievements, hold no position in the Ministries, Departments and Agencies in Nigeria except one who is a mathematics lecturer in one of our Universities. The mathematics lecturer actually submitted a paper to a US-based Clay Mathematics Institute in which he believed to have solved the Riemann Hypothesis. Submission of the paper by the lecturer does not constitute false claim even if the US-based Clay Mathematics Institute are to consider his solution faulty. Should we accept that those named are guilty of false academic achievements, Nigeria as a country has not suffered any damage as a result of their false claims. On the contrary, I consider all our qualified academics in the Ministries, Departments and Agencies who have failed to deliver required products from their offices as holders of false academic degrees. After enumerating some of the products that Western educated Nigerians in Nigeria's MDA have failed to deliver, I concluded, as you rightly quoted, that 'even though they have been certified (or is it authenticated?) as experts by the white man in their respective fields..' You took exception to my conclusion, yet you narrated your early sojourn in America while searching for work and the employer asked, "What can you do?" You explained the employer's query thus, "He wanted to know what I was qualified to do. I had only a certificate telling him that I was eminently educated. However, he wanted to know if I could type, drive, operate a forklift, or something. I was not qualified for anything in the technologically built economic system. I was, therefore, thrown into the lowest rung of the economic ladder - as a messenger." If, according to your narration, your certificate had testified that you could type, drive or operate a forklift, the employer would have employed you direct and it would have been your responsibility to prove what your certificate attested to that you could do. If you failed to live up to what your certificate claimed you could do, you would be sacked in addition to being investigated if your certificate is genuine, borrowed or purchased. If you juxtapose what your American employer wanted to establish with your educational qualification, with that of Nigerian academics employed, appointed, selected or elected in various capacities in the MDAs you will see that they were given those jobs on the ground that their certificates certified them as being able to deliver what is required from their respective offices. A professor of electricity in charge of Nigeria's power supply with adequately funded budget that produces and generates constant darkness must certainly, according to the result, be a fake professor of electricity. Another example is that of Nigeria's four refineries designed with capacity to refine 445,000 barrel of crude oil per day. Nigeria's daily consumption of crude oil when refined per day is said to be 408,000 barrel per day which means an excess of 37,000 barrel per day and Nigerians will not need to sleep at the petrol station to buy petrol. Thus, if the refineries function as they should, the pump maximum price of petrol in Nigeria would be N45 per litre. If you don't know, Nigeria's Oil Industry and its subsidiaries are managed by Nigerians with sophisticated academic qualifications in chemical engineering and specialists in oil refineries. Those that claim possessions of knowledge of what we need to produce by virtue of their certificates have been given the chance to demonstrate their knowledge and resultant productions have been zero. The zero or negative production in all Nigeria's MDAs where academically qualified Nigerians are employed is total and as such, their qualifications should be regarded as fake.
A graduate from an American university or even from any country living in America, is not being asked to generate or distribute electricity for a country or asked to manufacture a pin - K.J. Fakinlede I don't think any American will, just because he/she is a graduate in English language, seek employment in a company where the main business is to generate and distribute electricity. Water should find its level in the jar. It is not question of asking the non-electricity educated American graduate to produce and distribute electricity, he /she should know that when a person that would carry baby on the back is required a person with hunch-back should not apply. America is not a country where people believe that big grammar on darkness will bring light!!
Americans have been building economies based on technology for at least two millennia. The modern industrial sector in America started with the arrival of the Europeans on American soil - K. J. Fakinlede
What today is known as USA is a child of Britain that outgrew his mother. Leo Huberman narrated how Industrial Revolution got to America thus, "From 1765 to 1789 a series of strict laws was passed by Parliament. The new machines, or plans or models of them, must not be exported from the country ... skilled men who worked the machines were not to leave England ... under penalty of a heavy fine and imprisonment. England alone was to benefit from the new machinery; England was to become the workshop of the world. ...//... To the United States secretly, in 1789, came Samuel Slater, formerly a worker in English factories. He carried plans of the new machinery - in his mind. At Pawtucket, Rhode Island, he set up the first complete mill for spinning yarn on the Arkwright plan; the machines he designed and constructed from memory. The Industrial Revolution was thus brought to America (p.146, We, the People -THE DRAMA OF AMERICA)." Up till today, even when there are patents to protect new technical inventions and scientific discoveries, there are often court litigations among Europeans and between Europeans and Americans over ownership of new inventions and discoveries. Besides they have industrial spies operating in each others country. When we see how they compete with one another over how to prey on us, we must think if the Western Education they give to us is with good intention and for our own good. When the US was planning to become an imperialist state after World War I, she allowed some Africans, especially from Ghana and Nigeria to study in American Universities. At the same time, Black Americans suffered discrimination at all levels of life, including rights to quality education. It was as Edgar Furness expressed it in the History of the poor, "Given education to the children of the lower class of the society would make them contemn those drudgeries for which they were born (p. 148)." In 1963, when the Governor of Alabama was blocking Black Americans from attending the same University as White Americans, in spite of the Supreme Court's decision that the discrimination was unconstitutional, Nigeria was invaded by the US government sponsored 'American Peace Corps' to teach in our schools. The purpose of giving Western Education to us, therefore, is to colonise us economically and mentally. In practice Western education converts us to trained dogs that always swerve tail in readiness to obey any command from our Western World masters no matter how dangerous the command is to our wellbeing..
With regard to your assertion that the 'Americans have been building economies based on technology for at least two millennia, I noticed that, in response to an undisclosed commentator, you have explained that you did not mean that it should take as long as two millennia before Nigeria can develop technologically. That stand would imply that those of us demanding technological and industrial development now are too in haste. If that interpretation of your view is correct, you are not the first to hold such view. When Nigeria's MDAs dominated by Nigerian Engineers, Scientists and Economic Gurus were blamed for lack of industrial and economic progress in 1980, their response was that Rome was not built in a day and Nigerians should not expect them to do in 20 years what took Europe 100 years to accomplish. If it is Rome the officials at Nigeria's MDAs want to build for Nigerians, the prototype is there for them to copy and moreover their academic qualifications are far more superior than the builders of Rome. By virtue of their academic qualifications, building Nigeria to a Rome should be faster.
There should be correlation between the quantities of certified Engineers, Scientists and Economics in a country and its industrial and economic development. Those that the gods will make slaves must first be disorganised. Nigerians are disorganised, they cannot organise even for a day, not to talk of future. In 1948, Britain seized many cows in Nigeria and transferred them to Britain. In spite of the fact that the climate was not conducive to nurturing and breeding cows, their veterinary and agricultural scientists, saw to it that the cows were acclimatised to become source of beef supplies and dairy products for the British people. All cows in Europe originated from Africa. In 2018, Nigeria's arm-chair veterinary and agricultural scientists are still at the age of preserving nomadic pastoralists and their constitutional rights to, indiscriminately, graze around the country. Spaghetti and Macaroni became Italian food and spread to the rest of Europe after Marco Polo took the wheat food with him from China to Italy in 1295. Similarly, Potato became a staple food in Europe, after Christopher Columbus took it from American Indians to Europe. I am not certain if Marco Polo or Christopher Columbus had any academic degree but they have impacted positively in the lives of the people of their countries and Europe. Somewhere else you said that Nigerians believe that Government should do/own everything. That is not true. Nigeria has privatised nearly all state's owned properties among which is electricity. You may wish to remember that privatisation of state's owned companies in the Western World commenced during the era of President Ronald Reagan of USA and Prime Minister of Britain, Margaret Thatcher. The privatised companies were functioning and producing profitably. In Nigeria the state owned companies mal-functioned and it was believed that they would function better if they were privatised. Those who ran down the state owned companies bought them up during privatisation and are still running them in the same way as before privatisation, e.g. electricity: Generating Company of Nigeria (GENCO) and Distributing Company of Nigeria (DISCO). Here I have to repeat what I said earlier that if a person is employed and remunerated to generate and distribute electricity because his certificate portrays him as capable of performing that duty but at the end he failed to perform, the only reasonable conclusion must be that his certificate is fake or he is graduate from ISI EWU UNIVERSITY.
S. Kadiri
Skickat: den 15 januari 2018 03:17
Till: USA Africa Dialogue Series
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Kayode J. Fakinlede
I have chosen to engage in this give and take because of my genuine belief that you, like myself are truly concerned about the sorry state of many of the institutions, particularly the technological sector, in our country, and that we want to find ways for improvement. We may arrive at different conclusions as to why things are the way they are, but our love of country is not in doubt.
I also always like to take any opportunity I have to share my own life experiences with the hope that someone may see some sense in it and probably put it to use. And this experience covers those that I gained in the industrial sector, both at home and in the USA; and in the academic sector, both in Nigeria and overseas.
I choose to revisit some of the points I raised in my previous two articles with the hope that I can make myself more understandable.
I have said that the Europeans and by logical extension, America have been building economies based on technology for more than two millenia. By this, I mean that Europeans, with individual and disparate skills and expertise in myriads of fields, have learnt to come together, to build structures and infrastructure for which we come to admire them. Thus, when we look at an A-380 airplane, or an I-Phone, we marvel at the engineering skills that brought these into existence. These are marvelous inventions indeed! However, we forget to take into account the tens of thousands – yes, tens of thousands - of diverse skills that brought these into exisence. These skills range from the expertise of the janitorial crew to the highest level of management. If these other skills had not been available, the engineers would not have had the opportunty to put their knowledge to use.
Now, I talked about the project owner. This is the one that is responsible for the planning, financing, executing, and completing a project in order to achieve the desired objective. This person, group or institution is also directly responsible for pulling these disparate skills together and making them achieve the goal he set. This person, group or institution is definitely more important that an engineer, technologist or scientist in the achievement of a goal, for without him, the engineer will be of no use.
In the ownership of a project, the level of commitment is definitely crucial. I have poined out that in most cases, the individual who is ready to commit his life and resources to a project is definitely able to achieve more than an institution or goverment.
Management of people is a lesson that the productive European countries and America learned many centuries ago and that has made them highly successful. Pulling experts together to achieve a set goal is itself a skill that must be learned by eperience. Asking our governments to do this subjects us to probable failure since the commitment will not be there even of the financial resources are available.
And definitely, asking our engineers and scientists to perform without this support system is setting them and us up for disappointment. An engineer or scientist is only as good as the institution in which he works. A fish is alive because it swims in water. If you put it on dry land, even though you stuff it with a lot of food, it soon becomes a dead fish.
In order for us, as Africans to gain these skills that only come with experience, each of us must commit to a goal we are interested in and become experts in that area. Within his area, we will be able to manage others, and set achievable goals, and generally become experts. Without these individual expertise, we will not be able to do many things.
I have chosen not to directly respond to some of the issues you raised in your article because I personally am not an expert in those areas. However, I laugh at your conclusion about Nigerians:
‘Those that the gods will make slaves must first be disorganised. Nigerians are disorganised, they cannot organise even for a day, not to talk of future.’ S. Kadiri
This to me, may constitute an individual challenge for you. No kidding. Set up a project whose ultimate objective is the organization of Nigerians and see if Nigerians will not respond.
FAKINLEDE
Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju
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Cornelius Hamelberg
Baba Kadiri,
Once again, “When Nigeria was granted self-administered enslavement, the rank of leaders of our government was that of slave overseers.” ( Baba Kadiri)
Assuming that you too “hold these truths to be sacred & undeniable; that all men are created equal & independent, that from that equal creation they derive rights inherent & inalienable, among which are the preservation of life, & liberty, & the pursuit of happiness;,
wouldn’t you say that your assertion as explained by you is sufficient reason for e.g. the Biafrans to want to determine their own destiny, separated from what you call “self-administered enslavement” under leaders of government no better than “slave overseers” ?
N.B. Since you are not a Biafra supporter it's not expected that you speak on their behalf ...
On Wednesday, 10 January 2018 22:45:31 UTC+1, ogunlakaiye wrote: