NNOM, Bamgbose and institutionalisation of academic corruption in Nigeria

WHEN I received an invitation to feature as a Guest Speaker at this year’s edition of the Annual Forum of the Nigerian National Order of Merit (NNOM), held at the Merit House in Abuja, from December 1 to 2, 2015 under the theme, “Corruption Eradication and the Nigerian Ethical Revolution”, I was both overwhelmed and consternated over the unlikelihood of an impressive presentation by an upcoming scholar of my status, at such an uncommon gathering of high ranking achievers who have distinguished themselves as being heads and shoulders above their peers in their various callings especially in the academic world. The tension in me became heightened by the time I cast a close look at the programme and discovered that I had been invited to speak alongside such distinguished intellectuals as Prof. Oladapo Afolabi, Prof. Charles Nnolim, and Prof. Ayo Bamgbose. The tension however subsided when I discovered that 12 of us were actually scheduled for the Forum and the others included Prof. Pat Utomi, Prof. Femi Agbede, Justice Ayo Salami (rtd) and Comrade Adams Oshiomhole.

I must hasten to add that the trepidation that engulfed my heart was never a product of ignorance of how to approach the topic assigned to me. I have always been given the impression that I am a high academic achiever and I, with all sense of modesty, have always seen myself as such based on outcomes of previous assessments of me for academic elevations. The trepidation was rather due to the fact that I hitherto had always made all my high-sounding presentations and jaw-breaking submissions only among my peers and strictly in my own class. Doing that in the race-course of super professors, I muttered to myself, is not going to be an easy task. After all, three of the professors whose names feature on the programme are not common, regular or ubiquitous professors that one encounter casually on a daily basis. Consequently, I found myself presenting my paper in quick succession to Prof. Ayo Bamgbose whose paper addressed “Academic Corruption and the Role of the Nigerian National Order of Merit In Curbing It”.

In his introduction, the revered professor defines academic corruption as “any action that erodes academic standards in an institution” and I was quick to ask myself how many lecturers in my own generation can be absolved of this dimension of corruption. Under the guise of academic freedom, we exercise our liberties beyond limit and, to say the least, with incredible impunity. We absent ourselves from our duty post without official permission and hardly cover the prescribed content before examining our students at the end of a semester. We reschedule courses in defiance to the approved university timetable in order to suit our own selfish and unethical purposes. We go into the lecture room when we like, not necessarily, when we are scheduled to be there and without any regard for the university rules, leave the lecture rooms without giving students value for their tuition. More despicable is the fact that even the little, inadequate time that we spend in the class ostensibly amounts to a waste because some of us are teachers committed to the teaching of “nonsense” due to the fact that we ourselves no longer read and only rely on the old, wretched, obsolete notes that were bequeathed to us by some of our own teachers. In fact, virtually all our actions and dispositions as lecturers fit into Prof. Bamgbose’s characterization of academic corruption. Yet it should be pointed out that there still are a good number of upright and responsible lecturers in various Nigerian universities.

My generation’s penchant for corrupt academic practices seems unprecedented as we brazenly and unabashedly demand gratifications of various forms as though such demands enjoy some measure of legitimacy. “If you don’t buy my book, you can’t pass my course”. “If you don’t show appreciation by compensating me for my time, you’ll carry the course over”. “If you, Shade, Amaka or Amina, do not yield to my advances, you can’t graduate from this school”. “Besides, if you spend money to secure admission, you also need to spend your body for the money spent not to amount to a waste”. “Why can you not use what you have to get what you want?”. These are among the mantras on the lips of some lecturers in my generation. We in our own uncommon wisdom even announce our birthdays to our students several weeks ahead to enable them get well prepared to “appreciate” us. And incidentally, we as corrupt lecturers are handling a more morally bankrupt generations of students who are very proficient in the various dialects that constitute the Modern language of corruption. While answering questions from the floor of the NNOM Forum during interventions, I did not equivocate in stating that the respected professor’s presentation can not but fall short of capturing graphically the grave nature of today’s academic corruption which is several million times more sophisticated and advanced than what was known during the hey-days of the professor in the university setting.

My analysis finds support in the distinguished professor‘s assertion that “virtually all stakeholders in the university system may be involved in academic corruption”. He offered instances of this by adding, “From the students who cheats in an examination, to the lecturer who fiddles with marks and even the secretary who tampers with admission lists – all are involved” in academic corruption. My concern at this juncture is not about who and who are involved, given my belief that virtually everyone is involved directly or indirectly. Rather, my concern is about who and who to absolve of indictment in the pervasive dirty deals that are fast becoming the standards in our citadels of learning. A flashback to my past professional experience reveals that only a minority of my colleagues –past and present- can be given a clean bill. However, one clarification is due here: I learnt from Prof. Bamgbose’s presentation that even the upright and exemplary among the young lecturers, too, casually and innocently perpetrate some actions or inactions that may be characterized as academic corruption. So, the lecture, coming immediately before mine, was indeed a learning session to me.

The distinguished professor was at his best where he analysed such academic vices as associated with postgraduate research, plagiarism and appointments and promotions. He underscores the implication of plagiarism where he posits that “what is unacceptable is for someone to use material by someone else without acknowledging that such material comes from the work of another writer”. “In academics,’ Prof. Bamgbose insists, ‘this is a cardinal sin”. An example of this is when a plagiarist writer attribute another man’s idea or words to himself or “incorporates” a work by another writer into his own “without its being conventionally quoted with the use of inverted commas and the accompanying name of the author, publication date and date reference”. One was surprised that the distinguished professor dissipated much energy warning against this despicable practice when, in fact, it has already become a dominant practice among an upcoming section of academics. Yet, there seems not to be a better characterisation for plagiarism than Bamgbose’s “a serious form of academic corruption which deserves the severest sanction”.

The most unfortunate of it all is the aspect concerning promotions. Now it is no longer impossible to rise to professorial cadre without academic integrity and any credible evidence of scholarship. All you need do to achieve that is any one, two or all of the following. One, secure the support and sympathy of few of your brilliant colleagues in your own university or elsewhere who should be ready to add you as a co-author in their own publications even though you know nothing about their research. Two, indicate interest and preparedness to pay publication fee for any submission by any individual willing to accept your contribution to his research in such a material or monetary form. Three, Network well and get acquainted with few of the sub-standard, “regular”, journals such as a British Journal of Education published in Aba, American Journal of Social Sciences published in Bauchi, Australian Journal of Engineering published in Oshogbo, Canadian Journal of Sciences published in Jigawa, European Journal of Environmental Sciences published in Edo or Asian Journal of Business Administration published in Okokomaiko in Lagos. Four, get heavily soaked in your university’s politics and secure an unfailing support of a “political heavy-weight” whose contacts and goodwill can open doors for you within or/and outside your university. There is no gainsaying that there is a wide gulf between the dominant academic practices in most Nigerian universities and the tradition of true scholarship. Evidence of these despicable academic experiences is avalanche and easily accessible.

Prof. Bamgbose identifies among the malpractices among which lecturers engage in, “setting up of publishing houses and acquisition of ISBN labels for non-reputable journals, submission of self-published papers or books not refereed by any scholars, duplication of publications, submission of fake letters of acceptance, and joint publications in which several authors submit the same publications for their promotion”. The respected professor adds that at the University of Ibadan where he is based this dimension of joint publication was characterized as the esusu system (named after the Yoruba thrift system in which several people contribute and take out the monies collected weekly or monthly in turn). I venture to support Prof. Bamgbose’s view by adding that I, too, have worked with colleagues whose academic career thrives and flourishes on account of this shameful and debasing form of malpractice in various universities in Nigeria. In fact, the unfortunate practice is fast earning the status of a standard academic experience. Prof. Bamgbose shared an interesting experience with the distinguished gathering when, towards the end of his presentation, he revealed, “One of the worst cases I had encountered in my time at the Appointment and Promotions Committee was the case of a candidate who had neatly submitted an offprint claiming that it had come from a certain volume and number of a certain learned journal.” The world-famous professor adds that the candidate unfortunately met his waterloo in that unknown to him, the Editor of the journal in question was on the Committee before which the “fake” publication was presented. The Editor, Prof. Bamgbose continued, “dashed out briefly and brought back the number of the journal in question and the paper submitted by the candidate was nowhere to be found in the said journal.” The professor revealed that the candidate was “referred to the Senior Staff Disciplinary Committee for appropriate action”.

However, the professor did not reveal what the outcome of the candidate’s appearance before the Disciplinary Committee was. Most cases of academic misconducts or malpractices by lecturers are now being decided in favour of the perpetrators as most Disciplinary Committee members are often sympathetic to the fraudulent cause of their colleagues and are therefore obliged to fashion out a “soft landing” by invoking one or two judgmental technicalities to dismiss the allegation or petition as deficient in evidence or rationale, or even bereft of merit or integrity. What matters most is that their man, “comrade” or “colleague in crime” must not sink on account of plagiarism which, to them is a “dominant and unarguably pardonable malpractice”. So, what’s the great deal in someone appropriating or laying claim to your own ideas and words verbatim! “It happens everywhere and there is no issue in that”, they may brazenly and unabashedly remark. This is how some university professors ridicule and strip themselves of dignity and honour, in their desperate scramble to rescue a sinking colleague that will most certainly and inevitably sink in the face of un-perishable and ever-current evidence. After all, truth is unchanging no matter how much man schemes to influence judgments and alter decisions.

No right-thinking scholar will trivialize any case of academic robbery. It may be pertinent to allude to the experience of few world-famous scholars with the question of attribution of ideas and words in scholarship. I must not fail to acknowledge the distinguished historian, Prof. Siyan Oyeweso for sharing the story with me recently. Robert Hooke, Edmund Halley and a number of notable scientists were once involved in a discussion on science. Hooke had been head of the Royal Society of London for Improving of Natural Knowledge, sequel to his discovery of the cell through his study of wooden corks. This break-through research comprised his inventions and studies of micro-reality which was an uncommon achievement in Biology as depicted in his Micrographia. As regards Halley, he was an astronomer and geographer whose high professional achievements in the form of “observations, mapping of the sky and oceans of the earth and techniques of measurement led to the membership of the prestigious Royal Society.” Their discussion with their colleagues led to a re-examination of the Copernicus heliocentric view of the planet revolving around the sun. “Why such a precision in their orbits?” “Why not an equidistant circle instead of an elliptical orbit? They thereafter took turn in attempting a solution to the problem which was formulated by Halley (or Hooke) “in terms of Keplers third law of multiple orbiting objects”.

After several months without solution, Isaac Newton was contacted at Cambridge to contribute in solving the challenge. Consequently, Newton “invented the infinitesimal calculus and used its formulations to explain the gravitational forces through which the planets were kept in their orbits” On the eve of going to Press to publish the research in a book form, Halley disclosed to Newton that Hooke claimed the theory involved was his and he would love to be acknowledged in the preface. For being asked to acknowledge a name of an individual without any meaningful contribution to the research, “Newton was outraged and insisted he would prefer the book be burned than published with an acknowledgement to Hooke”. To address the impasse by looking into Hooke’s demand for inclusion of his name on the research, a meeting of the members of the Royal Society was convened by Halley. There and then, Hooke was asked to enlighten the rest of the Society about the theory to enable them have a clear picture of what it was all about. In response, Hooke argued that they should just include his name based on the preliminary formulations from the initial wager. The entire members of the Royal Society said they could not do so unless he explained the theory to prove that he really understood the research involved. Hooke’s inability to explain the theory prompted Halley to demand his admission that he did not deserve any acknowledgement on the research. That was how the treatise, Newton’s Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica, was published without any mention of Hooke’s name. Conversely, in Nigerian universities, it is embarrassing that some individuals find no strain in having their names stated as authors or co-authors to papers they no nothing about.

Rather than turn themselves into a safe haven where academic criminals are well protected by father figures in academic crimes, Nigerian universities may need to derive some inspiration from the Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge or the Nigerian National Merit Award (NNMA) which, in the words of Prof. Gbolagade Ayoola, “ensures that its own operations are devoid of academic corruption” especially with regard to “the processes of assessment by the various panels of assessors” which normally rely on judgments of external assessors. To strengthen his analysis on this issue, Prof. Gbolagade recalls a case concerning “a candidate who had almost passed through the assessment process when someone told the panel of his corrupt activities in relation to some of his publications”. The outcome was that the candidate was not recommended for the award due to the fact that some members of the assessment panels provided useful information bordering on the integrity of the candidate in connection with his information and it was investigated and confirmed to be true. I cannot but agree with Prof. Gbolagade in his opinion that this sensitive approach to the question of integrity is among the factors that have made the NNOM “a national award that has not been bastardized since it was first awarded in 1979”. One wonders whether any of our universities can deny a candidate a promotion on account of corrupt practices! One also wonders whether any of our universities can withdraw a professorial chair due to prior academic fraud concerning the candidates publications which forms a part of the submissions made by him to secure the elevation! Again, one wonders whether any Promotions Panel is still interested in any useful information that may expose the atrocious academic practices of any lecturer with strong association with a powerful academic or political god-father! Failure to attain such a level of integrity is arguably among the numerous factors that are now turning the Nigerian university system into a race course of academic dwarfs and intellectual Lilliputians.

Another dimension of academic corruption is lecturers’ cheating on their students through desperate scramble for visiting appointments as additional sources of income. One wonders what value could be added to another university by a virtually moribund, professionally uncommitted and academically unproductive lecturer whose presence is not felt in own university which is his main duty post and place of primary assignments. There in fact is a growing bastardization of the prestigious status of visiting professorship which once upon a time was both academically dignifying and professionally ennobling in Nigerian universities. Today, what often comes to mind in connection with that title is, albeit arguably, the image of an academic desperado that is cash-starved and highly desirous of additional sources of income within the academic setting. It is therefore not uncommon to see a single lecturer visiting about five universities simultaneously without adding any academic value to any other than high rate of truancy and exceptional degree of absenteeism. I once had as colleague a senior academic who held an administrative position of Head of Department and therefore capitalize on that to enjoin his visiting lecturers not to bother themselves coming to teach the students since he is there to protect their interest as long as they, too, protect his interest and “cover” him up in their various universities where he, too, is a visiting professor a la “rub my back, I’ll rub yours too”.

Yet there are some who generate their own additional income not be visiting fraudulently but by making best use of available opportunities as provided by the diverse backgrounds of their students. Most members of the working class or, more appropriately, political class, today had missed the opportunity to study at the appropriate time. And now that they have made both name and money, they feel the need to use what they have to get what they need. An undisciplined lecturer is naturally easily tempted by material gratifications from any quarters and many “politicians” and “business persons” are fast exploiting this unfortunate state to bag higher degrees from universities. It is in this light that one sees a candidate who could not make any sense of his or her doctoral studies completing such a programme in a jiffy after securing a political appointment. One wonders how an academic programme is completed overnight sequel to a political appointment. We are more likely to have as visiting, part-time or even regular lecturers on our campuses scholars who got their Ph.Ds through the instrumentality of political power or state machinery. How many lecturers have all it takes to say, “No” to a State Commissioner or Council Chairman! This shall turn out to be an academic disaster!

Back to my presentation at the 2015 Edition of the NNOM Annual Forum, Prof. Femi Osofisan was among the notable scholars who put me on a hot seat. Of particular interest to me is Prof. Osofisan’s interrogation of the idea of classification of corruption into major and minor or grave and trivial. Another distinguished asked a question concerning the religious dimension of corruption or corruption in religious settings. In responding, I did not equivocate in agreeing with Prof. Osofisan’s characterization and was able to provide evidence. As regards corruption in religious settings, I did not mince words in stating that my experience so far in the university system has shown that religious settings, leaders and personalities seem to account for highest percentage of corrupt practices recorded at certain levels. I shared my incredible encounter with some of the most revered religious personalities of my acquaintance and everyone there present was mouth-agape If religious settings in Nigeria do not really make a significant difference with regard to corruption in Nigeria, one wonders whose ox will be gored by the assertion that corruption is a Nigerian.

Even in the university setting in the country, students of religious studies and their lecturers do not distinguish themselves from others who are not associated with religion in their courses of study. For instance, as a lecturer with experiences from no fewer than three different leading universities in Nigerian, I can conjecture directionally and affirmatively that there are notable potentials for academic corruption in students from diverse backgrounds, religious studies inclusive. I can equally conjecture that there is no significant difference between the recorded degree of involvement of religious students in examination malpractice and that of their colleagues from non-religious disciplines. In a similar token, I can reveal that I notice no religious creedal or ideological patterns or peculiarities in lecturers’ attitude to academic fraud or misconduct and can therefore conjecture again that there is no significant difference between the levels of academic corruption among lecturers in religious disciplines and its levels among those in non-religious disciplines. In other words, there are upright lecturers everywhere alongside the morally bankrupt. The implication of this discourse for national development is grave. The certified illiterates and chattered empty-heads that survived academic training and graduated due to pervasive corruption in the system are now operating at various levels of the economy. After all, it is these same corruption-stricken institutions of higher learning that produce manpower for the country. Now a 2015 UNESCO Survey has just revealed that 65 million Nigerians are illiterate! And I venture to say that there is a strong connection between that and the high level of academic corruption in the country. May the Almighty bail us out!

• Dr. Saheed Ahmad Rufai is Ag. Dean, Faculty of Education, Sokoto State University, Sokoto.