BY IKENNA ASOMBA

When the Minister of Education, Professor Ruqayyatu Rufai’, last January, at the meeting of Vice-Chancellors of Federal Universities, Rectors and Provosts of Polytechnics and Colleges of Education, condemned the proliferation of honorary doctorate degrees in Nigerian tertiary institutions, her caution was greeted with mixed feelings.

In her argument, the minister had said that apart from the preponderance of the awards, government is concerned with the eligibility criteria and the credibility of the recipients which have both diminished its real essence, thereby tarnishing the image of the nation’s education sector.

She then called on vice-chancellors to restore the good tradition and avoid making it an all comers affair as convocation ceremonies are all about graduating students, which should take pre-eminence, even as she held that activities such as traditional dances, fund- raising and establishment of endowment funds should be scrapped from convocation ceremonies.

Amidst these mixed feelings, the question remains: How honorary are the honorary degrees continually conferred on politicians and business moguls by our institutions of learning.

Succinctly, honorary degree or honoris causa (Latin) before now, is an academic degree conferred “for the sake of the honour” on an individual whom a university or other degree-awarding institution has waived the usual requirements, such as matriculation, residence, study, and the passing of examinations.

Such an individual or individuals have distinguished themselves by their positive contributions to a specific field, or to the society in general, even though they might have no prior connection with the academic institution honouring them.

Moreso, prior to this time, ivory towers in the country nominate several persons each year for honorary degrees. These nominees usually go through several committees before receiving approval. Those who are nominated are generally not told until a formal approval and invitation are made. Even, individuals who were once conferred with academic degrees were usually stripped of it, when found culpable of questionable character in future (not in Nigeria, but should be so).

Even though the Minister is still contemplating on suspending the conferment of these awards by federal tertiary institutions, Governor Babatunde Fashola of Lagos State has done so, thereby dashing the hopes of politicians and business moguls, who hope to be conferred with honorary awards by the Lagos State University (LASU).

Fashola had during the 17th convocation ceremony of LASU, held recently, announced the indefinite suspension of the conferment of honorary award on any person by authorities of the university, saying the award had been desecrated in recent times.

Fashola said he had ordered LASU Governing Council to suspend the conferment of honorary award as part of measure towards improving the standard of the institution and restoring the value of honorary award by ensuring that only deserving persons were bestowed same.

According to him, the award had been abused as many now wait for the award before contributing to the development of the society.

He said it was inappropriate for any university, whose products are struggling to measure up to globally accepted minimum educational standards to be in the business of conferring honorary degrees on any category of people in the society, no matter how deserving.

According to him, such awards are conferred as a way of honouring contribution to specific fields of human endeavour or contributions to the society in general.“Can we truly say that all the honorary degrees in the society that we have awarded in Law, Engineering, Philosophy, Economics, Agriculture, among others, are truly reflective of the value added?”

While condemning the increasing appetite for any type of title among members of the society, he said the award would be suspended “until we begin to see an improvement in the quality of life of the people. “I cannot reconcile the award of honorary degrees with the level of under development in the society.”