By Godfrey AKON
The Vice-Chancellor, Federal University of Oye Ekiti and a professor of Soil Science, Abayomi Fasina, has warned that unless there was significant improvement in the working conditions of academics, especially professors, the issue of brain drain will persist.
Fasina in an interview said; “The reason is that people are not being paid well. The remuneration is poor. How much is the salary of a professor in Nigeria? The welfare is poor. But when they go out, they get $10,000 a month. Here, as a professor, you get N416,000 per month. When you retire, what is there for you? When judges and permanent secretaries retire, they collect their salaries till they die, professors don’t do that. That is why people have continued to leave.
“Recently, about six people resigned which we treated at the management meeting. People are being owed salaries; what they are being paid cannot take them home. It is a dangerous thing as long as the Federal Government does not address it. If you don’t educate people, the country will go bankrupt in terms of knowledge economy. It is dangerous. If you don’t develop technology, you cannot solve challenges of the world.
“To solve the problems, the government must listen to what ASUU is saying in terms of remunerations for the lecturers. Government believes that anybody can teach but when you don’t train personnel well, years later, it will show. Government should provide a conducive and an enabling environment for lecturers. We have committed and loyal lecturers in Nigeria. I want to commend our lecturers. Despite what they are being paid, which is peanut, they have the passion and the commitment and God will help them.”
