Professor Charles C. Onochie is an Environmental Microbiologist and vice chancellor, Renaissance University, Ugbawka, Enugu state. He spoke to RAPHAEL EDE on the need for the federal government to encourage privately-owned universities with TETFund intervention funds. Excerpts.
How has it been since you assumed office as the VC of this university?
It has been full of challenges, but we must not run away from challenges. It is through challenges that you know real men from men. One should be ready for any challenge that can come. If you are afraid of challenges, that means, you are not a man, but when I assumed responsibility, incidentally, I have to take the bull by the horn.
There was nothing like formal hand over, but it is one of those things you should expect if you are well-groomed in academics and administration. If you check back in my past life, I started from
somewhere in the tertiary institution. When I came back from abroad, having passed through the polytechnic level. I served as the secretary general of my association for almost 12 years. It is a good grooming.
Man, by nature, is a political animal and through interaction, you know what is what. We learn from experience through problems and that is the motto of this school. Ut Omnia Potestis, meaning. ‘You will be what you want to be’. So, through that whether you are somebody or nobody, the motto of the school is there to encourage you to be what you want to be. My own motto from college till now is ‘do not despair’.
How have you been able to blend taking into consideration where you are coming from?
I am a professor of Environmental Microbiology. It is the university that made me a professor. We were pioneer lecturers at the Institute of Management Technology (IMT), Enugu when we came back from abroad. We were recruited by Professor Mark Chijioke, the pioneer rector of the institute and a renowned professor of electronics
engineering.
It was after the creation of the new Anambra state and the introduction of indigenisation policy, which required non-indigenes to move, that moved us out of the system.
It was an opportunity for some of us from Anambra state to move to Nnamdi Azikiwe University. As a professor, you have to mentor, not only students from your university, but also others from other universities. I have supervised Master of Science (MSc) and Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D) students. I am also an adjunct professor in Enugu State University of Science and Technology (ESUT), and Ebonyi State University, even as the vice-chancellor of this university.
The present registrar of Enugu state College of education, Technical is my product. To produce a PHD candidate who became a registrar and student professors in other universities, is a credit to me.
Having studied the pedigree of other vice chancellors before you, is there anything different you would like to do here?
We have different ways of doing things, even though we may be aiming at the same point. Renaissance University’s focus is exclusively on academic, technical and ethical excellence and we set out to change the face of university education in Nigeria through a carefully structured and efficiently executed curriculum aimed at producing the total man who will always be preferred in the job market than the other graduates. I like challenges. I like to do things that people will know that, really, a Daniel has come judgment.
If you look around the school, you will see a unique mast which I constructed for my e-library, internet services and will also help the department of Mass Communication. It may interest you to know that we have a license for broadcasting, but not yet in operation. I would love to have my television or radio station to broadcast to the people during my tenure as the vice chancellor. It will be an advantage. I will also like to produce the first professor of this university. It’s also a credit to my administration because what we pray for in life is for our children to be bigger and better than us. From the first day I assumed responsibility, I started operating an open door policy.
There are certain things I would like to do differently. There will be no bureaucratic bottleneck, no protocol. My people say that a slave does not look for another slave for service. Do what you can do, don’t wait for people to do it for you; there is no need to procrastinate.
You talked about challenges, what is the greatest challenge facing you?
You know this is a private university, unlike those of the federal or state universities, where the enrollment is quite easy. The vice chancellors just sit back and the students will come in, but in private universities, it is different. I will be doing my first admission this academic year and I am putting things in motion to that effect.
If I can increase my students population, that will be a great achievement. I have not attended any meeting of vice chancellors. We have been talking of education all the time as if education is all about federal and state universities alone. The children in the private universities are also Nigerians. So, if there is any discussion concerning their welfare, those in private universities should be accommodated. When the revenue for tertiary institutions is only channeled to federal and state universities, it does not do anyone any good. Those students in the private universities, are they not Nigerians?
There must be a sharing formula for all the universities in Nigeria. For instance, if 50 percent is given to federal universities, 30 percent to state universities, the remaining 20 percent should be given to private universities.
It will assist them to develop and promote university education in Nigeria. By so doing, we will know that we are partaking in the sharing of the national cake. Those of us in the private universities cannot continue to be onlookers when others are enjoying the national cake. If such revenue is shared among private universities, it will be a boost.
Those that started their own universities should be seen as partners in progress in the development of education in the country. I lived abroad, and I know that most of those universities abroad are privately owned. The state universities are not many.
If we continue to put our education only in the hands of government, we are going nowhere. We must involve kind-hearted Nigerians or foreigners to help in the development of the education sector. If we are all educated, politics will be played better and not a situation where someilliterates will not campaign, but wait for the last minute to buy votes. If we are educated, we will know the importance or essence of permanent voter card, PVC and guide jealously.
To what extent will federal government assistance help to reduce school fees charged by private universities?
The fee paid in private universities is because there is no intervention fund from the federal government. The federal government should, as a matter of necessity, extent the hand of help to private universities through TETFUND. Private universities, are they not part of tertiary education? There was an announcement sometimes ago by the federal government about its plan to reduce school fees paid in federal universities.
If that happens, that will also make privately-owned universities to look at reducing cost and to help privately owned universities to maintain their locus, there must be external assistance from the government. We need to partake in the TETFund’s intervention fund. Education is not an easy assignment. It requires money that is why private universities find it difficult to establish faculties of engineering and medicine. They must be assisted to move forward.