Why, in your opinion, is the reason vice chancellors and workers’ unions in LASU are always trying to claim each other’s scalp.

Unfortunately for a university that should be a model for state universities in Nigeria, LASU is embroiled in the conundrum of protracted disconnect of management-staff dialogue and the lacuna of stakeholders responsibility for the institution.

A new governing council has been put in place at the school and a new vice chancellor appointed as demanded by ASUU-LASU. Do you think this development has the capacity to restore peace in the troubled school?

If the appointment followed due process as provided for in the extant laws and procedure was transparent, the appointment should douse tension. Attaining peace will also require building an all-stakeholder trust and confidence platforms as a priority by the new VC.

The last VC, Prof Obafunwa, was not the first helmsman to be chased out of campus by workers.  Why do these things keep on happening there?

Unfortunately, extremist positions by either side have never helped matters. To avoid a similar “banana peel” occurrence, the new VC should engage all critical stakeholders ranging from Lagos State government; staff and unions; parents; students; funding partners etc, in constructive consultations on all policies of the University.

University of Ilorin is currently a students’ and parents’ delight because of the seamless academic calendar it runs having banished the activities of ASUU. Would you suggest outlawing ASUU on campuses in view the clog they sometimes throw in the wheels of students’ career advancement?

The problem of crises in the Nigerian university system is not the making of ASUU alone. It all boils down to lack of consultations, trust and transparency among stakeholders. Agreements reached with unions need to be respected. When there are challenges, all parties should convene and map out the way forward. When a university is built on intolerance of divergent opinions, including the right to dissent, there will only be peace of the graveyard. This is not supposed to be a university culture, neither does it guarantee sustainable, quality education.

As a former vice chancellor, what are the major factors that vice-chancellors should take into cognisance in order to maintain a harmonious relationship with their workforce?

The road to sustainable, stable academic calendar and quality university education is to build a strong broad-based stakeholders participation in the institutions, rather than continue to see government as the sole funder of the system. Across the nation, we need to devolve the funding of the different levels of education. The Federal Government should take charge of just tertiary education; states should concentrate on secondary, basic and vocational and enterprise education. Where states desire universities, they should run them jointly.