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ABUAD – Modelling leadership, academic excellence

By Kolawole Igandan
22 October 2015   |   1:08 am
Nobody who met Aare Afe Babalola could doubt his self-belief. It hit you as forcefully as his patriotism and good looks.

ABUADNobody who met Aare Afe Babalola could doubt his self-belief. It hit you as forcefully as his patriotism and good looks. After his tenure as the Pro-Chancellor of the University of Lagos, he told some of his admirers that he would start a University of his own and would revamp the moral decadence and abyss education had plunged into in the last two decades. He pointedly told a bewildered audience, who thought that he could not leave his comfort zone and first love – LAW – to be confined in an office as a “School Administrator”, to watch out for the revolution he would wreak in the education sector. Cynics took him with a pinch of salt, not for reasons of the wherewithal, because they are very much aware of his exploits as the Pro-Chancellor of the University of Lagos, where he reversed the dwindling fortunes of academic malfeasance and politicization of the University and repositioned it to a centre of academic excellence, but because of the distraction from what has made him renowned across the world-Law.

Today, he is still being celebrated in the University of Lagos as a “primus inter pares”. His landmark reforms didn’t go unnoticed as the “Committee for V-C” twice gave him the prestigious award of the best Pro Chancellor in the entire Country. Skeptics were not bothered that he would not make a kill of his ambitious dream of founding a university, they were rather of the view that his “First Love”, LAW would distract him from making his dream of sanitizing the education sector a mirage. He pulled the rug under the feet of his critics when he decided to retire to his homeland of Ado-Ekiti to make real his conviction of having a first class and highly rated university.

“When he told us that he would be making a home permanently in Ado-Ekiti to really watch his baby – ABUAD, grow, we thought we didn’t hear him right. We know he is passionate about education and we also knew he has some kind of uncanny attachment to the land of his birth, Ado-Ekiti; but some cynics thought the idea would soon fizzle out, but having closely related with him for years, I knew Aare hated the word “Impossibility”.

“We have tested his resolve severally during our meetings back in the years and we eventually succumbed to his superior argument and when he sees our point too, he surrenders”. That was the submission of the Managing Partner of the law firm of Afe Babalola & Co, Mr Adebayo Adenipekun.

Seven years down the line, ABUAD remains an enviable bride and reference point of what qualitative and quantitative education ought to be.

Aare’s brilliance as an innovator has revolutionized university education in Nigeria. Indeed, he has a drive and vision that renews itself, again and again. A visit to the university would confirm that the University is preparing the grounds to take an enviable place, not only in Nigeria, but the world.

What makes ABUAD so important is the speed with which it has captured the imaginations of millions who had given up hope on the resuscitation of quality education in the Country.

In describing the succour ABUAD offers the teeming populace yearning for quality education, the former secretary of the National Universities Commission (NUC), Professor Peter Okebukola noted recently.
“In seven short years, Afe Babalola University, Ado-Ekiti (ABUAD), established in 2009, has developed one of the most learner-friendly and high-end research supporting facilities in Nigeria. “Keen watchers of the development of the University will not wander far in identifying the reasons for such remarkable progress. Its founder, Aare Afe Babalola, two -time winner of the best Chairman Council Award for the entire Nigeria University System, a lover of Education and a global legal luminary has been bitten by the quality university education bug. “Like a crack air traffic controller, the founder of ABUAD keeps the operations of the University on his radar and gently but firmly guides all the statutory organs of the University on course with the vision of leading education reform in Nigeria by providing a world class educational centre of excellence in academics, character, sports and vocational development.

“His standards are high and pitched at a level beyond Harvard. He demands that all Staff and Students strive to attain or surpass the standards.

“He is not intrusive of the activities of the Board of Trustees, Vice Chancellor and Senate. However, when there is a whiff of compromise of quality and any act that can bring the name of the University to disrepute, Baba Afe, as Professor Oye Ibidapo-Obe and I fondly call him, will quickly put on his disciplinarian hat” Okebukola stated.
Apart from the fact that the University is a huge construction site, playing host to different buildings sponsored majorly by the Founder with corporate organizations, blue chip companies, banks and individuals who believes in the promise that the University holds , endowing structures and academic Chairs, ABUAD has some of the best equipment in its laboratories only comparable with what can be found in Ivy League Universities.

Little wonders that retired but experienced academicians, young and budding lecturers, global scholars, researchers, fellows and members of various professional bodies are thronging ABUAD because of its stimulating academic climate.

To underscore the founder’s dream of not making the University that of academic excellence alone, but a leadership centre, the university is beginning to re-awake our consciousness by stealthily rewarding men and women that have shown rare patriotism and uncanny ability to affect the live of the citizenry in many ways than one.

Every year, at its convocation, the University tells the story of character, service, endeavour, patriotism, leadership, tradition and culture by awarding honorary degree to those deserving of it.
As a way of elucidating a nation’s recent history, Professor Attahiru Jega, the former chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) would be awarded an honorary degree on account of his exemplar conduct of the year 2015 presidential election.

In his acceptance letter to the founder, Jega noted with glee: “I lack adequate words to record my thanks and appreciation to you for the privilege and honour of inviting me to be an awardee of an Honourary degree of Doctor of Letters from your esteemed and prestigious University.

“You have been an inspiring leader, a committed patriot, a dogged defender of Justice and a passionate and prolific philanthropist in constant pursuit of worthy causes.

“I am personally proud to be so honoured with an Honorary Doctorate from this University, which has great potential to be the best, not only in Nigeria but in the world”.

Alaafin of Oyo, Oba Lamidi Adeyemi, also a recipient of an award, also noted in his letter of acceptance that: “ABUAD has come of age as a major player in the global industry in tertiary education and is already a trail blazer in shaping the lives of the younger generation”.

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