The executive secretary of the National Universities Commission (NUC), Professor Abubakar Adamu Rasheed, has advised the management of the National Institute for Nigerian Languages (NINLAN), to pursue a postgraduate university status and avoid being in competition with anyone as there were already a good number of universities awarding degrees in such areas across the country.
He made the plea last Monday when he received in the audience the institute’s chairman, governing council, Professor Francis Egbokhare, alongside the executive director, in his office.
Rasheed suggested that they could offer courses in Nigerian languages, which, according to him, would be more attractive, if well-managed.
He added that such an arrangement could produce manpower to support the universities and the industry.
The executive secretary argued that he would not support the idea of NINLAN becoming a university, as he believed that, if somebody from the West could speak the Yoruba language why would such an individual go to a university to study it? He stressed that the same thing applied to other languages. He said the reason for siting NINLAN in Abia was just for geo-political reasons whereby all the six regions must be represented, since the country already had the French Language Village in Badagry, Arabic Language Village in Ngala, Borno State, and the Nigerian Mathematical Centre in Abuja.
Rasheed noted that the French Village was sited in Badagry, very close to the Benin Republic, whose citizens speak French, which was of benefit to the students in that institute and the same could be said of the Arabic Language Village in Borno, where Arabic was the official language.
He said there were about one million Nigerians who speak the Arabic dialect, especially in the Shua-Arab area of Borno State, adding that the Mathematical Centre was established to promote the teaching of Mathematics.
Rasheed explained further that, if NINLAN insisted on becoming a university, the stumbling block was the renaming of the structures, a senate must be in a place like what was obtainable in universities.
He stated that the law could be applied when renaming, as most of the structures have to be changed, explaining that in such a situation the NINLAN structure might be lost to gain a university. In his remarks, the Chairman of Governing Council of NINLAN Professor Francis Egbokhare, said that the Institute wanted to align itself with Nigerian universities by becoming a degree-awarding institution with the idea of making its products job creators, adding that this was the more reason why the management was clamouring for the Core Curriculum Minimum Academic Standards (CCMAS).
Professor Egbokhare believed that job opportunities were many for NINLAN graduates and he also agreed with the Executive Secretary that converting NINLAN to a postgraduate school would be more attractive and structural changes would be done in view of what the Executive Secretary said. He explained that they were working hard to actualize the NINLAN mandate, arguing that using Nigerian Languages to teach in the universities was still a big challenge but that a strong NILAN would actualize this policy. A standing committee was put together by Professor Rasheed to discuss the issue of having a Senate and the position of a Vice-Chancellor since the Institute was interested in becoming a university. Members of the committee included the Deputy Executive Secretary (Academics), Dr. Noel Biodun Saliu; Director Executive Secretary’s Office (DESO), Mr. John Mairafi; Director Human Resources, Mr. Boniface Odum as well as the Executive Director NINLAN, Professor Obiajulu Emejulu.