Omokungbe: More Funding for​ Yabatech Will Make It Globally Competitive

Mr. Femi Omokungbe, Rector of Yaba College of Technology, in this interview with Funmi Ogundare, disclosed efforts made to ensure the institution bounces back after the COVID-19 pandemic, noting that more funding is needed for the tertiary institution to become globally competitive

The college will launch an endowment fund to commemorate its 75th anniversary. What plans are on the ground for that?

We want to compete globally among institutions and for us to do that, we need fund, as government cannot fund education alone. We need the interventions of international organisations, corporate organisations, states and federal governments, as well as the alumni association to assist the college for us to be able to achieve our dreams and compete globally with any tertiary institution. That is why this management and the council have decided to think outside the box to generate more funds and take care of our dilapidated structures that have decayed over the last seven and half decades. So that is why we are thinking seriously of the endowment fund launch, which will be coming up on September 15, 2022. When you talk about the global ranking of institutions, it is not child’s play. It takes funding. Is it for the lecturers to publish in high impact journals, which is one of the criteria for ranking? Is it equipment and laboratory? Is it conducive classrooms and internet facilities? These are part of the criteria for ranking, and to also have high carrying capacity, we need infrastructures like building state-of-the-art things in the classrooms and offices. The fund that we have from the government is not enough to execute all of these, and as such, we feel that launching an endowment fund will go a long way to assist the college in achieving its dream.

You have been rector for the past four years. What have been your challenges so far?

The challenges are majorly funding because there were so many things we put in place as our vision when we were coming in, and we thought we could achieve if we had funds. Unfortunately, the fund is not there. But within the little that we have, we tried our best to make the best use of what has come our way within the last four years. If we want to be fair, you would have seen the difference comparing five years ago with what we have presently. We have tried our best to see that we move the college forward.

Did you reach out to the alumni association?

We reached out to the fellows of the institution, and you would agree with me that the last two years worldwide due to the pandemic has had a negative effect on every sector of the economy and ravaged the whole world. Perhaps, if there had not been that pandemic, maybe we would have done better or the gestures of friends of the college would have been well noticed in terms of assistance. We have spent four years, but two years of it had been under the pandemic, which has not been fair enough to our four years.

How were you able to overcome the challenges?

It’s all about bracing up for challenges, and having the courage to withstand these challenges has been our strength.

Given the inadequate funding, will you suggest reintroducing tuition fees in tertiary institutions?

If you go down memory lane, I am an advocate of Nigerians paying tuition. The country is not ripe enough to have a tuition-free education. Even in the western world, their citizens pay tuition. When you compare it to what international students pay, it might be low, but then it is not free. It looks funny to me when you pay millions for your children in primary and secondary school, and you now want to train a medical doctor, an architect or a lawyer free of charge in tertiary institutions! Are we not joking? And you expect the standard to be high?

The college seems to have a larger population of students. Are there plans to move them to Epe?

Epe is not a permanent site but just a campus. Yaba remains the main campus of the college. With a larger population, we are having more programmes, and more are being relocated to Epe because it is becoming choked up.

How many of your programmes are so far accredited?

Virtually all our courses are accredited, and those that are due for re-accreditation would be done this year before August because it is a five-year programme. There were some that we did in December 2019, and they will not be due until 2024. Those that were not due as of 2019 that are due this year or last year would be re-accredited. Don’t also forget that the pandemic contributed to it.

What is your carrying capacity?

It depends on each of the programmes. It is not a general thing. There are carrying capacity; streams that you could have based on each course, but there is a statutory 70:30 ratio, science-based to others which we are following strictly in Yabatech and according to the NBTE guidelines. We don’t flout it.

What is the secret to your success?

We give it to God and the staff that we have. They have been cooperative. I can’t do it alone. The management that we have has been cooperative. There is no discord among the management, and so everybody keys into the vision of our forefathers. The staff, to an extent, are level headed.

How did you settle the students’ union crisis in the college?

When we came in, the student union was banned by the council, and it took some effort for us to talk to the council and the need for them to be back. The truth of the matter is that it is a bit difficult when you don’t have a student union to deal with. When there is a crisis or uproar, there would be nobody to call on. So the strategy is that we should have a students’ union that will have a representative so that when anything happens, we will have somebody to call. That is how I see it, and that is what we have been doing, and we have been meeting with them regularly, know their challenges and let them also know the way students unionism should be done. Sometimes when there are workshops for their leaders to learn how it should be, we send them. So we have been having a cordial relationship with them, and their welfare is paramount to this administration.

How do you manage the issue of cultism in the college?

Before when rectors come, the security usually sandwiches him and the students find it difficult to know who the rector is sometimes. So when I came, the first thing I did was to ask the security officers to go to their duty post and we were interacting. I go to the cafeteria, eat and even buy things for the students too. I give the students courage. The cult boys on this campus are less than 10 per cent of the total population. So if they are 10 per cent, why will they override the 90 per cent remaining? Are they not cowards? The cult boys are not spirits or ghosts. Recently, I wanted to collect a gun from a student who was inside a car on campus, and I was able to recover six guns from some of them at the end of the day. One has to be streetwise and devise means of dealing with them. I sent a message to them to come to the table to explain why they were shooting guns on campus. We had also partnered with the police and we asked the boys to come, but they refused. We caught one and he was brought here by the police and he started confessing. The boy asked me to bring my laptop and he downloaded all the pictures of their members from the internet. He, however, warned me that I should not allow them to know that there would be consequences. So I cooperated. So on the day of their exam, with the information that I have, I went to the classrooms, picked out all of them and handed them over to the anti-cultism officers.​
The boy who exposed his colleagues was also arrested. Even for the ones who brought their vehicles to campus, I ensured that the tyres were deflated. I asked the security officers to take photographs of the plate numbers and remove it. It was because the plate numbers of the cars were removed, some of the boys were forced to come on campus and it was at that point that they were arrested.

After YABATECH, what are your plans?

I will be going back to the classroom at the Civil Engineering Department.