STATE UNIVERSITIES IN NIGERIA: PROBLEMS, PROSPECTS AND OUR COMMON FUTURE

“State Universities in Nigeria: Problems, Prospects and Our Common Future”

  By

                      Michael O. FABORODE, PhD, FAEng, FNSE

Secretary-General, Association of Vice Chancellors of Nigerian Universities (AVCNU) and Former Vice Chancellor, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife

“State Universities in Nigeria: Problems, Prospects and our Common Future” M. O. Faborode, FAEng

1.0 Preamble

I would like to acknowledge the great honour of being chosen to deliver the 27th convocation lecture of this University. I consider this to be a hybrid convocation lecture because it is not a Commencement Address in the real sense of it even though it is being delivered not as a stand-alone event as in many other universities, but a lecture that is strictly constrained by that circumstance. I hold the conviction that a Convocation Lecture, unlike a shorter Commencement Address, affords the speaker the opportunity to espouse the intrinsic academic characteristics of erudition and boldness in the perception, dissemination and preservation of the truth, academics being “custodians of the unfettered search for truth”. I have elected to speak on “State Universities: Problems, Prospects and Our Common Future”, and I intend to be truthful and firm in the content of the lecture. My goal is “to address higher education generally but zeroing in on state universities, in relation to their mandate, and hence, relevance to local, regional, global human progress and the overall development of our terrestrial ecosystem.