Cleric Tasks Govt, Varsities on Shared Responsibilities, As UI Installs New VC

Government at all levels and university administrators in the country have been advised to stop attributing the slow pace of growth, development and performance to their predecessors.
In particular university administrators were admonished to demonstrate the unique ingenuity that distinguished them as egg-heads in searching for solutions and providing alternate sources of meeting essential needs of their institutions while waiting for government to deliver on its funding responsibilities.
The Chaplain of the Chapel of Resurrection, University of Ibadan, Venerable Dr. Victor Oladele stated this during his sermon on Monday at the inauguration service for the new and 14th Vice-Chancellor of University Ibadan, Prof. Peter Olamakinde Olapegba.
The cleric reminded Olapegba and others elected to serve humanity that they all willingly sought for the offices and that they were elected to inherit both the assets and liabilities.
He argued that liabilities no matter how legitimate, should not constitute the hurdles to performance, “that is what transformative leadership is all about.”
The vicar also urged the federal government to always remember the goose that laid the golden egg in relation to the University of Ibadan, the country’s premier university, established as a University College in 1948, by providing her with all needed financial support to continue to be “the mother of universities in Nigeria.”
At the second leg of the ceremony, which was the inauguration lecture, Prof. Akin Ogundiran of Northwestern University Everstern, Illinois, USA, charged African universities to brain-storm and come up with robust capacities needed to transform challenges arising from AI technology to assets and part of the continent’s contribution to global knowledge.
He called for the establishment of AI Institute African universities and urged the new VC to spearhead it.
The new VC while acknowledging government’s funding of education, appealed to the government to prioritise education, especially university education, stressing that no nation can develop beyond the knowledge of her institutions.
Reflecting on his predecessors from the pioneer VC, Prof. Kenneth Dike to the immediate past VC, Prof Kayode Adebowale, the new VC vowed to build on their legacies, saying that history must be an instrument of transformation, not encumbrance.