Bullish political bigwigs and the UWI

IDON’T usually pay any attention to gossip columns. But a former colleague at the University of the West Indies (UWI), Mona, made me read last week’s Tuesday Talk published in The Gleaner: “Talk about a bull in a china shop! The intellectual ghetto is about to teach the bull a lesson about succession planning. And no amount of appeal to the political bigwigs will change anything. Better than the soaps.”

It was the late Wilmot ‘Motty’ Perkins who branded the UWI an intellectual ghetto. Motty certainly didn’t intend this as a compliment. He seemed to have meant a substandard institution that’s the academic equivalent of an impoverished innercity community. I don’t suppose Motty realised that the word ‘ghetto’ has quite complex origins. It was first used to describe the neighbourhood in Venice to which Jews were banished in 1516.

The political decision to restrict Jews to a ghetto had unexpected consequences. In a 2016 Guardian article headlined ‘500 years of the Venetian ghetto: commemoration and history’, Marie-Jose Gransard reports the following: “In what was, for a time, a tolerant Venice, Jews were not forced to convert and the ghetto became a place of study and scholarship; money-lending and the sale of some goods, such as jewellery and fur, was allowed. Christians attended concerts in the ghetto, and Christian architects and builders created synagogues. This Jewish melting pot had a lasting cultural impact on Venetian language, cuisine, music and dance.”

Poor Motty! The original ghetto was “a place of study and scholarship”. So to call

The UWI an intellectual ghetto is actually redundant. Ironically, Motty’s insult can be seen as a subconscious acknowledgement of the rich tradition of scholarship that has been consolidated on all four campuses of the University of the West Indies, which is now celebrating ‘70 years of service, 70 years of leadership’. Cock mouth kill cock!

FORCED TO SPECULATE

So who is the bull in the china shop? Or, more to the point, who is the incompetent administrator at the UWI, Mona, who is clumsily bungling the business of succession planning? The problem with gossip is that it depends on vagueness for its effect. It promises more than it actually delivers. Readers are forced to speculate about the identity of the victims of gossip. So here’s what I’ve come up with.

The Mona Campus principal is retiring shortly, after getting a two-year extension of his appointment. There’s a powerful faction that wanted him to stay on, allegedly to their own benefit. But rules are rules so he now has to retire. Could the outgoing principal be the bull in the china shop who has failed at succession planning? And is “the intellectual ghetto” supposed to be a single person, not a huge institution, that is going to teach the bull a lesson? And if he’s retiring, what difference would the lesson make? Out of the china shop, the bull would not suffer any consequences for mashing it up. If he actually did!

And as for “an appeal to the political bigwigs”! Why, exactly, would the bull want to appeal to the politicians? Who are they? The prime minister of Jamaica and the minister of education? How big are these bewigged gentlemen? Can they authoritatively challenge the regulations of the University of the West Indies, which is a regional institution? According to Tuesday Talk, the bull’s appeal would fall on deaf ears.

BEST MAN FOR THE JOB

There’s been a lot of talk on all campuses of the UWI – and beyond –about the process of selecting the principal at Mona. It’s not just Tuesday Talk. It’s every single day of the week since the University Council recently met to consider the recommendation of the Appointments Committee. Mind you, the deliberations of University Council are supposed to be confidential. But there are always leaks.

From what dripped down the pipeline, I gather that the vice-chancellor announced to University Council the name of the candidate selected by the Appointments Committee. But, in a surprising turn of events, a political bigwig objected to the recommendation. It is not clear how much weight should be attached to this objection. There are long-established regulations guiding the appointment of campus principals. But, in the spirit of diplomacy, it was proposed that the matter be discussed further with more bigwigs.

So Tuesday Talk got it all wrong. The destabilising challenge to decision-making at the highest levels of The University of the West Indies is not better than the soaps. Comparing this grave governance crisis to a TV melodrama trivialises the vital work of the institution. And it’s not a matter for a gossip column. It’s certainly not cheap entertainment.

I’ve concluded that it’s the political bigwigs who are the bulls in the china shop. They are the ones trampling down the regulations of the UWI. Allegedly, the political bigwigs’ preferred candidate for campus principal at Mona is a compliant man who toes the party line. Sometimes, the best man for the job is a woman. Especially one who does not wear her politics on her sleeve!

Carolyn Cooper, PhD, is a specialist on culture and development. Email feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com and karokupa@gmail.com.