Nigeria Academy of Letters Honours Rasheed, Oyeweso, Others
Funmi Ogundare
The Nigeria Academy of Letters (NAL) recently inducted five eminent professors, who have distinguished themselves in academics and quality of research into its college of fellows.
The induction ceremony, which held at the University of Lagos, also witnessed the admission of 50 new members into the fold.
The inductees included the Executive Secretary, National Universities Commission (NUC), Professor Abubakar Rasheed; Professor of History, Osun State University, Osogbo, Siyan Oyeweso; Professor of African and African-American Studies, Joseph Inikori; as well as a Professor of French, Unionmwan Edebiri.
Delivering the 19th convocation lecture of the academy with the theme ‘Patriotism: The Patriot and the Nationalist in an Emergent Democracy’, a lecturer at the Institute of African Studies, University of Ibadan, Professor Dele Layiwola, called for genuine mental decolonisation to remove inferiority complex deeply ingrained in the psyche of the African people, adding that there is need to take confident, definitive and bold steps to resolve the conflict between indigenous values and the foreign values that modernity has foisted on Africans.
“There must also be a transformational process of cultural education and re-orientation so that the teaching of our indigenous languages, traditional African medicine, our flora, fauna and ecosphere take pre-eminence in our value and material formations. “We must as a matter of urgency too, imbibe a pan-African orientation which believes in the integral transformation of our public and institutional moral order.
“We must now passionately invest in our formal and informal educational and research institutions for without these parameters, no nation on earth would expect to take any significant developmental strides, no matter her demographic or geographical value,” Layiwola said.
Rasheed had in his acceptance speech, which he delivered on behalf of other recipients, promised of his ideal of partnering with the academy in attaining excellence and high standards in the country’s education sector, while pledging openness to guidance and cooperation from the academy in the NUC’s task of raising the standards of university education in the country to meet contemporary trends globally.
Briefing journalists after the ceremony, Oyeweso described the induction as a call to duty and renewal of faith in academic discipline and the need for those in the field of humanities to show greater relevance to the society.
“For you to become a fellow is a tall order, not every professor can become a fellow or a member. There are few guidelines and criteria for these. You must have been a professor for a minimum of five years and served as a dean, but the minimum criteria is that you must have been a professor for a minimum of 10 years, for you to be a fellow. It is the academic in you; the quality of your teaching and research, as well as currency of your publications.”