A bill for the establishment of Bola Ahmed Tinubu Federal University of Languages has reportedly passed the first reading at the House of Representatives.  Section 2 part I of the bill,  which is sponsored by the Deputy Speaker, Benjamin Kalu, and eight others, provides that the university, when established, shall encourage “the advancement of learning and to hold out to all persons without distinction of race, creed, sex or political conviction, the opportunity of acquiring a higher education in Nigerian languages and cultures”. It further claims that the university is aimed at: “Producing socially mature persons with capacity to communicate, understand, and use Nigerian languages for national development.”

There are several questions begging for answers with respect to the proposed university: One, is the question of whether there is really any need for a University of Languages considering that many of the 62 Federal and 63 State Universities in the country have departments of Languages or Institutes of African Studies that are already providing the services that the proposed new university will purportedly offer. What is even more ridiculous is that there is also a federally owned National Institute for Nigerian Languages, NINLAN, which was set up in Aba, Abia State, via Decree 117 of December 30, 1993.

The Institute was aimed at being the “apex institution for research, teaching, documentation, and coordination of studies in Nigerian languages”, according to NINLAN’s website. Following from this, it is obvious that the promoters of the Tinubu University of Languages are either unaware of the existence of NINLAN, or if they did, failed to clearly establish the value addition of the proposed Tinubu University of Languages to both the mandate of NINLAN and the various institutes and departments that offer similar services in the country’s institutions of higher learning.  

Two, in terms of value addition, the promoters of the proposed university  also seem unsure of what they really want to accomplish – besides the obvious facts that they want to set up a Federal University, which will be sited in Abia State, the home state of the Deputy Speaker, and which will be named after the President.  For instance, the promoters claimed that the university, when established, will act “as agents and catalysts, through postgraduate training, research and innovation for the effective and economic utilization, exploitation and conservation of Nigeria’s natural, economic and human resources”.

How studying indigenous languages will lead to the “effective and economic utilization, exploitation and conservation of Nigeria’s natural, economic and human resources”, remains unclear. It is equally unclear how training in Nigerian languages will lead to “producing socially mature persons”.  There are several other bogus claims about what the proposed university could achieve that one gets the impression that whoever wrote the concept paper merely worked from answers to questions, and had very little knowledge of what a university education, or research in indigenous languages, is all about.

Three, a related question is whether establishing a University of Languages is really the best way to promote interest in local languages. If the aim of the proposed university is to encourage people to learn how to speak local languages, then a university education is not required for this. If this was really the aim, the sponsors could achieve the aim better by setting up, or encouraging the setting up of centres in local communities where local languages of interest could be learnt. The sponsors could also invest in the development of apps for teaching local languages or promote a number of existing apps that provide such services.  If, on the other hand, research in indigenous Nigerian languages is their main objective, then endowing chairs in various Departments of Languages or Institutes of African Studies in our existing institutions of higher learning could do the job better and cheaper. 

Four, how many Nigerian languages could realistically be taught in the proposed university?  Or will it be just the usual case of the dominant languages in the country (WAZOBIA)getting disproportionate attention? If that becomes the case,  as it is likely to be,  given that it will not be feasible to offer courses in the country’s over 500 indigenous languages and dialects, then the proposed university, rather than facilitating cultural awareness and unity – as claimed by the sponsors of the bill – will unwittingly become a tool of disunity because speakers of the languages left out are not likely to have any emotional buy-in to the university. 

Five, is the moral issue of naming institutions or monuments after a sitting President or Governor. In most climes, monuments are named after leaders have left office – not when they are in office. Even worse is to name an institution after a President who is still less than two years in office, and who is yet to find his bearing in the office, and who is generally  mocked as “T-Pain” for the unprecedented hardship his government has brought to Nigerians. If I were President Tinubu, I would distance myself from any effort to name institutions or monuments after me or even give me awards, including by the Bretton Woods institutions. Such honours are best savoured if done when the person is not in a position to extend favours.

Generally, monuments should be built to immortalise an idea not to humour those in power. In this connection, one may want to know what Tinubu has done in the area of promoting local languages that should warrant a University of Languages being named after him. The whole bill therefore oozes of sycophancy taken to a ridiculous level. I know that some Nigerian Governors have named institutions and monuments after themselves. But that is pure narcissism, and if people do not resist such, it is because they have either been cowed or simply do not care. 

Six, it may also not be out of place to interrogate the possible motives of the sponsors of the bill. Since the said university is to be sited in Abia State where the Deputy Speaker comes from, it may be safe to assume that he is the arrowhead of the bill, and consequently speculate on his possible motives: Is the Deputy Speaker following the path of some Governors who wrongly believe  that their legacies will be measured only by building enduring physical structures that will outlive them, often  white elephant projects such  as airports  that are hardly viable  and universities that are not properly funded?

Does the Deputy Speaker hope that by naming the proposed university after President Tinubu, he would tickle his ego, and buy the President’s support for the project? Is the Deputy Speaker hoping that by ingratiating himself to the president he would secure his position in the event of the president being re-elected in 2027? Is the Deputy Speaker eyeing a governorship seat in Abia State, and believes that the Ahmed Bola Tinubu University of Languages would be his evidence of ‘concrete achievement’ while in office?  And what, if one may ask, has become of the Deputy Speaker’s Peace in the South East Project, PISE-P, which he launched with fanfare in the ancient town of Bende, Abia State on December 29, 2023?

Seven, Shakespeare was right that there is no art to find the mind’s construction on the face, so I admit that all the above possible motives are mere speculations. But whatever the Deputy Speaker hopes to achieve by the Ahmed Bola Tinubu Federal University of Languages, he should take lessons from other Nigerian politicians whose sycophancy cut short their own career. A typical example is Ibrahim Mantu, the former Deputy President of the Senate (2001-2007). During Obasanjo’s alleged third term plot, Mantu was thought to be the arrowhead, and he boldly claimed that he would give his life for Obasanjo.

However, no sooner did Obasanjo leave office than Mantu, eager to rehabilitate himself politically from the damage his championing the hugely unpopular tenure elongation plot had done to his image and career, turned against Obasanjo. Nigeria’s political ecosystem is unfortunately littered with several Mantus. And this should forewarn both the sycophant and the leader being humoured. Given the transient nature of power, sycophancy, beyond a certain octave, is a sure career killer. 

*Jideofor Adibe is Professor of Political Science at Nasarawa State University, Keffi.