Sonny Echono canvassed clear guidelines for leadership selection in federal universities, writes TUNDE OLUSUNLE
It was most appropriate that the University of Abuja, which has since been renamed Yakubu Gowon University, chose for the inaugural public lecture series on research findings of its Leadership and Governance Centre, a topic which devolved from its recent experiences in leadership succession. In the aftermath of the completion of the five-year tenure of Abdulrasheed Na’Allah as Vice-Chancellor of the institution mid-2024, the university would go through the next year and half, without a substantive chief executive. In the twilight of his tenure as Vice-Chancellor, Na’Allah was indeed taken to court by some academics in the institution, over an internal council election. Aisha Sani Maikudi, and Mathew Adamu, both professors in the institution, took their turns to steer the ship of system, while the federal government, proprietor of the university, shopped for Na’Allah’s replacement. Such was the level of leadership unsettledness which engulfed the university for a near two-year stretch, threatening the gains of preexisting stability.
The reconstitution of the Governing Council of the institution by President Bola Tinubu, May 27, 2025, which witnessed the installation of Dr Olanrewaju Tejuoso, a member of the 8th Nigerian Senate, between 2015 and 2019 as Pro-Chancellor and Chairman of Council, breathed a new air into the institution. Tejuoso who had hitherto served in a similar capacity at the University of Lagos, moved swiftly to restore order in the drifting foremost tertiary institution in the nation’s capital. By November 7, 2025, the Council had identified Hakeem Babatunde Fawehinmi, 56, a Professor of Clinical Anatomy and Biomedical Anthropology, who was Vice-Chancellor of the Nigerian-British University, Oke-Ikpe, Aba, Abia State, as the new chief executive of the university. He took over from Adamu during the 2025 yuletide and has striven to engender rapprochement and cohesiveness amongst various groups and interests in the academic community, and refocus the citadel to its core concerns of learning and research.
