Varsity Don Restates Commitment to Accounting Education

Funmi Ogundare

A Professor of Accounting and Finance, Babcock University, Ilishan Remo, Ogun State, Akintoye has reiterated his commitment to ensuring that accounting education and its professionals in the country will be rejuvenated.

Akintoye, who made this known recently while unfolding series of plans by his department for students of the institution, said he is not working alone, but in conjunction with other pillars of accounting education like Professor Enyi Patrick Enyi, Professor Sunday Ajao Owolabi and other accounting scholars who have collaborated to distinguish the programme at the university.

The international scholar with over 70 publications, local and international to his credit and has attended many local and international conferences and read many papers in the area of accounting, finance and financial economics, said the effort to distinguish the programme started during the administration of the former Vice-Chancellor, Professor Kayode Makinde, when he was invited in December 2012 to join the team in the department for the running of postgraduate programmes of MSc and PhD Accounting.

“The MSc programme continued till 2014 when I was appointed to steer the ship of the Department of Accounting, when I swung into action by repositioning the department by working with other erudite professors to pursue the PhD Accounting, which the National Universities Commission (NUC) had earlier denied.

“With this move, the students would perform better, especially with innovation, introduction and implementation of new ideas and programmes hitherto alien to the profession,” he said.

Akintoye noted that he afterwards introduced a collaborative programme, which was in place at the University of Cape Town, South Africa when he was concluding his PhD.

Asked how the innovation would affect accounting education and turn things around in the accounting profession in general, the don said: “Babcock University would be producing her first set of about 19 PhD Accounting graduates with contemporary discuss in accounting theories, three of which have won research grants before the ongoing oral examinations.

“With every sense of humility and awareness, history is now to be made since 1948 till now when it has not been possible to produce five PhD holders in Accounting Education at a stretch. I can assure you that Babcock will be producing its first set of PhD Accounting graduates, this number and model will be the first in the history of accounting education in Nigeria where timely qualitative PhD accounting degree has always been regarded as a tall order.”