It is no longer news that the educational system has weakened all over the world. From the third-world countries of Africa and Asia to the scientific countries of Europe and the Americas, what is left of most universities today is “past glory.” The advent of technology and several technological tools supposedly to improve and pace learning has simplified and weakened the educational system. It has turned out to be Frankenstein’s monster. Lecturers, and by extension researchers, have become lazy as the quality of academic research dwindles. All of these have resultant effects on the students and the educational space. How did we get here? Several factors can be attributed to this educational downturn.
“To bring about quality research, the Nigerian government should create an enabling environment for academics and researchers to thrive.”
We should not be befuddled by the fact that the country still boasts of some brilliant academics who have promoted the country’s image globally. However, among every twelve there is always a Judas, so the mantra goes. Post-independence academics had proven themselves excellent and energetic. The times of Chinua Achebe, Olusegun Obasanjo, and Wole Soyinka shall remain in blessed memory. The field of history, for instance, will not forget about the scholarship of professors Kenneth O. Dike, Saburi Biobaku, J.F. Ade Ajayi, Obaro Ikime, A.E. Afigbo, T.M. Tamuno, Isaac Adeagbo Akinjogbin, E.J. Alagoa, Samuel Akintoye, and their survivors’ professors Toyin Falola and T.G.O. Gbadamosi, among others. Professors Ayo Bamgbose, Teslim Elias, Muhammed Abdulrazaq (SAN), Theophilus Ogunlesi, and Akin Mabogunje, among others, will be remembered for their outstanding research and contributions to their respective fields.
The issue with poor research by faculties today can be adduced to the poor promotional system. Much, and unnecessary, attention is paid to quantity rather than quality research. How many books has he written? How many articles has he published? Those are the questions of the day. Yet, the promotional system has further worsened the situation. The requirements for promotion are much different from post-independent scholars when faculties do not need many publications to become a professor. Therefore, a scholar has the time to conduct painstaking and policy-oriented research. During an in-office interaction with Dr. Habeeb Sanni, a foremost Lagos historian, I was reminded of a Lagos historian, a foreigner, who spent between ten and fifteen years in Lagos examining the daily activities of the Lagosians, to the point of understanding the Yoruba language before his departure. Such a finding stands the test of time. Contemporary books and journal articles do not meet up with their predecessors. What is left are big vocabularies and concise publications.
Moreover, the lack of funding presents a huge challenge for contemporary scholars. Research is costly and therefore requires funding. In a system where scholars cannot gain access to online materials, it reduces the quality of research. There is no travel grant to conduct oral interviews and surveys. Instead, Nigerian scholars struggle to buy textbooks from their meagre salaries! The government and the universities seldom organise fellowships that enable collaborative research. We do not seem to realise the essence of grants and research sponsorship in Nigeria. What you have is the incessant committee of lawmakers and government appointees who appropriate huge budgets for white elephant projects that were to be abandoned or continued (at will) by the following administration (s).
The lack of infrastructure affects the quality of research. The epileptic power supply made laboratory research difficult. The absence of adequate and equipped public libraries contributed to the dearth of research in Nigeria. What is more, the university libraries are nothing close to a standard. There are scanty books in some university libraries. Besides, the lack of convenience heralds great challenges for the few researchers who make do with libraries. It was either the librarians falling short of their job by inappropriate cataloguing or there was noise from library officials and readers alike. More challenging is the fact that many universities are not built in a serene environment. I was once in a particular university library where the noise from nearby transporters—agberos and conductors—disturbed users. These acts are against the ideals of a good library and are some of the ordeals of conducting academic research in Nigeria.
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The academic will of a researcher is no exemption. The unhealthy competition among Nigerian scholars is a bane of quality research in the humanities, like every other field. Researchers are more interested in figures than in conducting thorough fieldwork. Research students want to acquire their dissertations and bag their degrees as quickly as possible. The supervisors, on the other hand, are too corrupt and tribalistic not to realise the effect of wishy-washy fieldwork on academic prosperity and governmental policies. As supervisors allegedly delay the research students because of enmity, favouritism hastens unequipped projects. Perhaps we should be more disturbed about the citation and referencing of sources—the heart of research in the humanities—at a time when some reference styles no longer harp on cited pages.
Regrettably, the manipulation of research ethics is not limited to Nigerian scholars. I have attended conferences and read international works! They are not close to their predecessors. Lest the research students realise that many pioneer works are (usually) the magnum opuses of the earliest scholars. Last year, I had the opportunity to talk to Professor T.G.O. Gbadamosi, who told me that his book, Islam among the Yoruba, was his thesis supervised by Professor J.F.A. Ade Ajayi at the University of Ibadan. Likewise, Professor Bolanle Awe’s thesis on “The rise of Ibadan as a Yoruba power in the nineteenth century” signified the potential of a distinguished scholar. Professor Ayo Bamgbose’s A Grammar of Yoruba—Fonology Ede Yoruba—alongside other works brought him to the limelight.
Moreover, questionnaires and surveys are challenging. Either they were not thoroughly conducted or the respondents were too honest to fill in the right information. In fact, many of these have become a source of thesis for emerging scholars.
To bring about quality research, the Nigerian government should create an enabling environment for academics and researchers to thrive. Grants and consistent funding of research projects, fellowships, and workshops should be enabled. More importantly, the researchers need quality infrastructure to enhance efficiency. Electricity and communication networks should be improved. However, Nigeria needs brilliant findings to initiate realisable policies. We should be challenging traditional theories that do not stand the test of time. Our scientists should formulate novel hypotheses and save this country from relying on Western predictions, which are, at best, commensurate with their situational realities. More novel findings, like the recent Professor Enyi Patrick Enyi’s statistical data analysis, should be produced. Society has a role to play in providing apt answers to questionnaires and surveys, as they play a great role in fieldwork.
Abdulkabir Muhammed hosts the Crescent Avenue program on LASU Radio. He can be contacted via [email protected].
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