Opinion

Rebuilding the intellectual community on the continent’-Zubair A Zubair

Published

2 years ago

October 20, 2022

Zubair A Zubair

Neo-liberalism has devastated African universities, turning them from vibrant centres of new thinking and academic comradeship into factories churning out marketable academic products and “saleable” students, according to leading Tanzanian scholar-activist Issa Shivji.

African scholars have become mere data “hunter-gatherers” instead of producers of theory; while the nascent radical intellectual community that emerged on the continent in the wake of independence has been decimated, says Shivji, who occupies the Mwalimu Julius Nyerere Research Chair in Pan-African Studies at the University of Dar es Salaam.

In the meantime, the Global North has retained control over the upper reaches of knowledge production since the 1970s, when higher education on the continent was devalorised and starved of public resources as African governments embraced neo-liberal prescriptions and austerity programmes.

“The very idea of the university was undermined,” says Shivji.

“The World Bank and its associates said that Africa did not need thinkers; rather, it needed only implementers of policies,” he says. “The ‘luxury’ of theorising could be left to the developed North, which would do the thinking, while Africa did the acting.”

Under the “long shadow” of neoliberalism, he says, “the market determined the form, content and depth [of] courses. Theory was eschewed; and action and a skills-oriented approach were privileged.”

“Instead of being centres of thinking and basic research, African universities were turned into sort of factories, with the academics being told to package and brand their products, including the students, to make them ‘saleable’.”

One consequence has been a devaluation of the quest for original knowledge on the continent and, in particular, theory, which Shivji views as the “highest form of knowledge”.

Quality of African scholarship has deteriorated

The trend has been made manifest, he says, in a number of ways: the content of PhDs has become increasingly descriptive rather than theoretical; the academic vocation to produce new knowledge has been undermined by scholars’ increasing dependence on consultancy work; university courses have become vocationalised, with increasing numbers of “executive evening courses” being taught; the younger generation of academics unquestioningly imbibe intellectual fads with little regard for existing scholarship; and the task of mentoring young faculty is undertaken by visiting scholars on a jaunt.

Shivji identifies a lack of seriousness among “today’s neo-liberal generation of young faculty members who neither care about nor have any sense of the traditions of their own alma mater”.

In particular, he notes that young African academics educated “outside”, in the North, tend to return as adherents of new intellectual fashions: “It is as if they want to re-invent the wheel and start all over again.”

Meanwhile, as the quality of the African scholarship on offer has deteriorated, international financial institutions have “jumped on the bandwagon”, providing funding for foreign scholars to come from the North with the goal of upgrading local scholarly standards, according to Shivji.

“These visiting academics … come for a few weeks or a couple of months; rush through a couple of courses; take time off to visit local tourist resorts; and off they go, leaving behind no sense of academic collegiality and camaraderie, which should be the stuff of university life,” he says.

However, “this is not what universities were meant to be”, he argues.

‘A site for thinking’

“Neo-liberalisation, in my view, devastated the fundamental rationale of a university just as it devastated the social fabric in Africa. The very idea of the university was undermined.”

Shivji describes his idea of the university as “rather orthodox”.

“I think a university is a site for thinking, a site for the production of knowledge, and, of course, a site where ideas clash and knowledge is developed.”

“The idea of the university should be of a kind of comradeship which is established among the faculty but also between the students and the whole academic community. The aim is not simply to produce people with certificates but rather to cultivate deep scholarship and, if possible, some societal commitment.”

In pursuit of this goal, Shivji advocates a pan-African approach under which academics across the continent collaborate to rejuvenate the African intellectual community and seek to produce a new breed of ideas.

He notes the scale of the rejuvenation effort given that “a whole generation of deep, committed scholarship” was lost under the neo-liberalisation of universities from the late 1970s.

“The few faculty members who stuck to their guns found themselves abandoned both by colleagues and students,” he notes. As a result, “the radical and nationalist faculty staff failed to reproduce itself”.

“What remained was not an intellectual community propounding, advocating and debating the idea of the university and its ethos, but only a few individuals,” he says.

A need for collective purpose

In this context, Shivji advocates for a restoration of comradeship and a sense of collective purpose among academics in order to help rebuild the intellectual community on the continent.

“Such work can only be a collective effort, not an individual task,” he explains.

“Although individuals may manage to spark debates, they cannot easily sustain them. They soon get demoralised for lack of support; and there is always a limit to how much an individual can withstand in terms of derision and ridicule from an ignorant young faculty and a hostile university administration.”

Shivji also envisages the university’s restoration as a pan-African project although, at the same time, he stresses that national governments “must be persuaded that [higher] education is a priority on the basis that, like health, it is a strategic productive sector rather than just a service sector”.

Shivji’s argument for a continent-wide pan-African approach is based on what he terms “the fragility of the idea of nationalism based on the nation-state” and separate territorial domains; and also on what he views as the strength of regionalism in the African context.

“Unlike in other continents, regionalism in Africa – that is, pan-Africanism – gave birth to territorial nationalism, not the other way around,” he says.

Accordingly, he proposes that the effort to reclaim the idea of the university and build an African intellectual community “should take place as a pan-African endeavour at the continental level”.

Reclaim the ability to theorise

Adopting such an approach, Shivji contends, the present nature of African knowledge production can be transformed and African academia can reclaim its credibility and capacity to theorise.

“I think a new breed of ideas is required, which depends on many discussions, and debates being held at every opportunity … among African intellectuals.

“So, there is a need to engage in a double process: the process of building a pan-African intellectual community; and the process of raising these important questions.”

Shivji cites the collegial nature of the former University of East Africa, which had campuses in Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda, as an example of the kind of pan-African collaboration that could be fostered.

“There were annual meetings bringing together the subject teachers from the different disciplines at the three sister colleges [in Dar es Salaam, Kampala and Nairobi]. Views were exchanged on the content of the courses; on the work being undertaken; on the pedagogy, and so on,” he recalls.

“These discussions were very fruitful, indicating how the task of changing orientation cannot be an individual endeavour; if it is to be effective, it must always be a collective enterprise.”

Shivji contrasts this collaboration with the present academic climate, in which, for example, “few intellectuals in universities in other African countries know about or keep track of the debates taking place in South Africa”, and vice versa.

However, such is the kind of pan-African interaction that he would like to see as “a starting point” for the restoration of African academic endeavour, although he emphasises that this “cannot be left to happen spontaneously”.

“It should be undertaken in a conscious and conscientious way.”

This is imperative, says Shivji, particularly since “the continent cannot continue to depend on the North to revive its universities”.

“The North is not interested and understandably so. Higher education has become a major export for some countries in the North. Why, then, should they invest in reviving African universities?”

From a practical point of view, Shivji advises that South Africa, which became a destination for many academics leaving other African countries as their universities were starved of resources, has the potential to provide the leadership required to rebuild the African intellectual community.

“I would hope that greater energy and thinking in the South African academy may be directed at supporting and building relations with universities in other African countries, not in a predatory fashion but in the spirit of genuine pan-African collegiality,” he says.

“In this regard, the South African academy should plug into African debates, and not be constantly overawed by European debates.”

This article is based on an interview conducted by Professor Crain Soudien for ‘The Imprint of Education’ project, which is being implemented by the Human Sciences Research Council, South Africa, in partnership with the Mastercard Foundation. This project, which includes a series of critical engagements with experienced scholars and thought leaders on their reimaginings of higher education in Africa, investigates current and future challenges facing the sector, including best practices and innovations. Mark Paterson and Thierry M Luescher edited the transcript for focus and length.

Related Topics:Community Intellectual Rebuilding

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Opinion

Exposing the fraud in NASS budget-Jaafar Jaafar

Published

2 days ago

May 2, 2024

Nigerian Tracker

By Jaafar Jaafar

In an unprecedented budget fraud, the National Assembly has appropriated N370 billion on running costs, contingency, vague and duplicated projects for the Senate and House of Representatives in the 2024 Appropriation Act.

I’m not talking about the hundreds of billions of naira padded in other ministries, departments and agency, but what they budgeted for their welfare and running of the National Assembly.

In the N370 billion NASS budget, the lawmakers duplicated projects and created new, unnecessary projects that increased the budget from N170billion in 2023 to N370 billion this year.

In budget (under Statutory Transfers ), the NASS budgeted 36,727,409,155 for the National Assembly Office; N49,144,916,519 for the Senate; N78,624,487169 for the House of Representatives; N12,325,901,366 for the National Assembly Service Commission and; N20,388,339,573 for Legislative Aides.

A senator recently told me that each of them (and members of the House of Reps) is entitled to five aides, while the four presiding officers (Senate President, Speaker and their deputies) have at least 3,000 aides. In total, you are talking about over 5,000 aides!

Despite the foregoing, the NASS budgeted N30,807,475,470 for “General Services” and N15billion as “Service-Wide Vote” – known in administrative parlance as “contingency” or “security vote”. The NASS never had anything like service-wide vote in the past as “service-wide vote” is always exclusive to the Executive arm. Insiders said this is a clear case of budget padding as the purpose for the huge appropriations are vague.

Even the retired clerks and perm secs (despite receiving their pensions) are not left out in this public funds buffet as they got N1.2billion padded for them.

Apart from padding the intangibles, the NASS will spend N4billion to build recreation center; about N6billion to furnish committee rooms for the two chambers and; another N6billion to build car parks for senators and members (don’t ask me whether they lack any parking space).

And despite this, the lawmakers padded N30 billion in the FCDA budget for “Completion of NASS Chambers” and N20billion for “completion of NASS Service Commission”! In the same budget, the lawmakers set aside another N10billion (under NASS budget) for the completion of National Assembly Service Commission building! How did this happen? No be juju be dis?

Still hungry to devour public resources, the avaricious parliamentarians budgeted another N3billion for the “Upgrade of NASS Key Infrastructures”. How come? What about the N30billion budgeted for “Completion of NASS Chambers”?

NASS Library Complex, named after President Tinubu’s Chief of Staff, Femi Gbajabiamila, got N12billion as take-off grant and another N3billion for purchase of books.

Like other institutions under NASS, the National Institute for Legislative and Democratic Studies got N9billion without clearly stating how or where the resources will apply to. The same institute also got another N4.5billion (is this ‘jara’?) for completion of its headquarters.

Despite the dedicated powerline and powerful generators backing up power supply in the National Assembly, the lawmakers budgeted N4billion to install solar power system. I guess this will give them a reason to pad billions for the purchase of batteries every year.

The committee that superintended this butchery of public resources, the Appropriations Committees of the Senate and the House of Reps, got N200m each for a job well done.

Opinion

Workers’ Day and The Nigerian Workers In Perspective

Published

3 days ago

May 1, 2024

Nigerian Tracker

By AbdurRaheem Sa’ad Dembo

Every 1st of May workers celebrate their day globally .It is always a day of reflection, celebration and emancipation of workers around the world.

In Nigeria,May Day as a holiday was first declared by the People Redemption Party (PRP) Government of Kano State in 1980.Afterwards it became a national holiday on May 1, 1981

Before venturing to restrict myself to Nigerian workers let me take a broad look at how May Day emerged in the world.Workers’ Day, stemmed in part, from an ancient European Spring festival,but its modern manifestations arise from the organised efforts of socialist and communist groups to establish a time for honouring workers and the working class.To be specific, the holiday was first promoted by the International Workers Association in 1904 to commemorate the slaughter of protesting labourers in Haymarket Square in Chicago ,United States of America in 1886 and it was to be a day to push for the eight-hour work day and other demands.

The date May 1st was chosen because,in the USA, the eighth- hour workday first came into effect on that date in 1886.It was predicated on the demands of the Federation of Organized Trades and Labour Unions.There was a general strike and a riot in Chicago in 1886, and eventually, the eight -hour workday was legally recognised.

Many people tend to attend the National May Day celebration in Abuja and other State capitals.The president or State Governors would be there as the case may be to make a speech, and thousand would fill the Eagle Square or state stadium to listen to the President or Governor.Some people attend number of other events that hold across Nigeria on May Day,organized by schools,labour unions,hospitals,and other various institutions.People use the day for relaxation since it is a public holiday.

In Nigeria,some people participate in nationwide marches and rallies on workers’ Day or Labour Day.More often their major concerns are usually to clamour for an increase in the minimum wage,an end to workers being left unpaid for months,the need for government action to address the high unemployment rates of recent years ,and the necessity for government action to address the high unemployment rates of recent years, and the need to move Nigeria off of over dependence on petroleum exports.

On a May Day in Nigeria, politicians and labour leaders will give out speeches on the strength and the challenges of Nigerian economy , and on how to improve it for the general good of the country.

It is significant to say that Nigerian workers both in public and private sectors are facing enormous challenges.The disparity in the salary structure and irregular payments of salary as witnessed before the coming of Buhari’s administration in 2015, where a lot of state Governors could not pay their workers for several months.

The Buhari administration ensured that bailouts were given to states to enable them offset their unpaid salaries to workers.That was a plus for the Daura man administration.

Meanwhile, President Tinubu’s administration has also sustained the legacies of prompt payment of workers salaries in the last one year.It is expected , because even as Lagos State Governor he had no history of owing workers.

In a larger context, welfare of Nigerian workers are not properly taken care of, most especially those in private sectors.There are situations where teachers in private schools are being paid peanuts as salaries,whereas the owners or proprietors charge the parents homongous school fees.This is not a hearsay I was once in that shoe as an English language teacher.

The area where the civil servants in both Federal and States are feeling the heats is the non regular payment of promotion arrears.According to sources some agencies under federal government are being owed promotion arrears since 2018.This is not a healthy practice, though some sources said the federal government has put the payment in batches and it is now being paid bit by bit.In some states the promotions are not even implemented let alone payment of its arrears

As Nigerian workers join others around the world to mark 2024 workers’ Day,it is expected that the ongoing negotiation by the federal government and labour leaders on new minimum wage will yield good results.

It is imperative to say that the Federal Government should fix the economy for the collective good and progress of the country.No minimum wage can ameliorate poverty, if there is consistent economic instability.

The level of inflation ravaging Nigerian economy is worrisome.Any minimum wage that is less than hundred thousand naira today won’t make any appreciable impacts in the lives of average Nigerian workers.

Essentially,Corruption can only be tackled effectively and holistically,if there is a reasonable living wage for the civil servants.You can’t fight corruption in a country where workers welfare and retirement package are relegated to the background.According to the human rights lawyer,Femi Falana ” corruption cannot be meaningfully fought by governments that pay poor wages to workers,owe workers and pensioners arrears.”

To the NLC and TUC leaders, providing sincere leadership is key to the quality ,emancipation and progress of Nigerian workers.Adam Oshiomhole was an example of a good labour leader in the history of Nigeria.He stood for the workers even in the face of oppression.So the current leaders should take a cue from his tireless comradeship for the benefit of Nigerian workers.

Nigeria is a blessed country and a land of prosperity; her workers have no reason for penurious lives.

Happy Workers’ Day

abdurraheemsaaddembo@gmail.com

Opinion

Minimum Wage Increment: Be Proactive My Governor.

Published

4 days ago

April 30, 2024

Nigerian Tracker

Governor Abba Kabir Yusuf

By-Abba Hamisu Sani

1st of May every year is a special day for workers in Nigeria working with the government or with the Private sector.

The main issue ahead of this year’s celebrations is the expectation of the new minimum wage Increment.

President Bola Tinubu is expected to announce the new salary scale as Vice President Senator Kashim Shatima hinted recently that by the 1st of May, the new minimum wage will be ready for implementation.

Here I want to salute the courage exhibited by the Edo State governor Godwin Obaseki who has increased the minimum wage for workers in the state from 40,000 naira to 70,000 naira ahead of the 2024 Workers Day celebrations.

This prompted my attention to urge my state governor Abba Yusuf to follow the suit of Edo State governor in this direction.

Kano workers suffered a lot in the hands of the immediate past administration, ranging from different kinds of deductions which causes uncertainty on the amount to be collected by a worker and even pensioners every month.

Governor Abba if you do the same as Obasaki, the Kano people will be happy with you as it will boost the state economy and currency circulation.

It is very imperative at this time to be proactive and not wait for the Federal government announcement before taking your step in making Kano workers happy.

Infrastructural development is quite needed but at this time social security is the most critical as it has been said “A hungry man is an angry man”.

Workers’ salaries are too low to cater to their basic needs, such as food, rent, transportation, and school fees for their children while they see politicians cruising in jeeps and other expensive cars.

Finally, Governor Yusuf remember that these workers have sacrificed a lot during the 2023 elections to see that you emerged as Kano governor.

Is very important to consider their plight at this moment of critical economic hardship.

I urged all comrades in different forms of struggle including civil society Forum to join me in pushing the Kano State government to implement a new minimum wage in a dignified manner as the Edo State governor did.

Abba Hamisu Sani is a
Media Consultant /CEO Time Base TvAfrica & Africa Press.
Can be reached via timebasetv@gmail.com