This
is one gift horse which, contrary to traditional saying, must be
inspected thoroughly in the mouth.
Primary from all of us must be a
plea to the MKO Abiola family not to misconstrue the protests against
the naming of the University of Lagos after their heroic patriarch.
Issues must be separated and understood in their appropriate contexts.
The family will acknowledge that, among the loudest opposing voices to
Jonathan’s gift horse, are those who have clamoured tirelessly that MKO
Abiola, the Nigerian nation’s president-elect, be honoured nationally,
and in a befitting manner.
Next is my confession to
considerable shock that President Goodluck Jonathan did not even
think it fit to consult or inform the administrators of the university,
including Council and Senate, of his intention to re-name their
university for any reason, however laudable. This arbitrariness, this
act of disrespect, was a barely tolerated aberration of military
governance. It is totally deplorable in what is supposed to be a
civilian order.
After that comes the bad-mouthing of MKO
Abiola and the Nigerian electorate by President Jonathan who referred to
MKO as the “presumed winner” of a historic election. While applauding
the president for finally taking the bull by the horn and rendering
honour unto whom honour is due, the particularities of this gesture have
made it dubious, suspect, and tainted. You do not honour someone while
detracting from his or her record of achievement. MKO Abiola was not a
presumed winner, but the President-elect of a nation, and thus
universally acknowledged.
It is sad, very sad, that after his
predecessor who, for eight full years of presidency, could not even bear
to utter the name of a man who made his own incumbency possible, along
comes someone who takes back with the left hand what the right has
offered. However, there is hope. Legalists have claimed that there
is a legal flaw to the entire process. The university, solidly backed by
other tertiary institutions nation-wide, should immediately proceed to
the courts of law and demand a ‘stay of execution’. That should give
President Jonathan time to re-consider and perhaps shift his focus to
the nation’s capital for institutions begging for rituals of re-naming.
After all, it is on record that the House of Assembly did once resolve
that the Abuja stadium be named after the man already bestowed the
unique title of “Pillar of African Sports”. He deserved that, and a lot
more. What he did not deserve is to be, albeit posthumously, the centre
of a fully avoidable acrimony, one that has now resulted in the
shutting down one of the institutions of learning to whose cause, the
cause of learning, President-elect MKO Abiola also made unparalleled
private contributions.
Let me end by stressing that my
position remains the same as it was when the University of Ife was
re-named Obafemi Awolowo University. I deplored it at the time, deplore
it till today, have never come to terms with it, and still hope that
some day in the not too distant future, that crime against the culture
of institutional autonomy will be rectified. Let us not compound the
aberrations of the past with provocations in an era that should propel
us towards a belated new Age of Enlightenment.
Wole Soyinka
