The Past and Future(s) of the Postcolonial University

In Femi Kayode’s thriller Lightseekers (2021) the protagonist Philip Taiwo investigates the brutal murder of three students in the fictional university town of Okriki in the Niger Delta. Woven into the plot are aspects that shape the everyday life of many universities in Africa’s most populous country: strikes, corruption, underfunding, and political, religious, and ethnic conflicts between and within different status groups. Nigerian and African universities have been afflicted by crisis since the late 1970s. At the same time, the university landscape has grown enormously in the last two decades. Partly the consequence of rapid demographic growth, Nigeria has almost 200 state-recognized institutions, divided into federal, state, and private universities. Graduates are produced in record numbers, but many cannot find employment and struggle with unemployment. The promise that education – and higher education in particular – opens the door to a better life has long been broken.

University of Ibadan, 1962.

Lack of resources, catastrophic conditions for research and teaching, and lack of career prospects for academics are just some of the topics addressed in a series of articles on the ‘postcolonial university’ published in the journal Africa. The starting signal was given in December 2023 by Jeremiah O. Arowosegbe, who taught for many years at the University of Ibadan, the oldest and arguably most respected Nigerian University, before he moved to the University of Leeds. Competition within unequal global conditions, interference by corporate political interests, and the profit orientation of private universities are urgent problems of African education systems. Besides externally driven global imbalances, the state is the greatest obstacle to academic freedom and the autonomy of universities. Citing Scholars at Risk, Arowosegbe notes that the continent has some of the highest numbers of attacks on academic freedom in the world.

In the period immediately after independence, universities in Africa were able to act largely autonomously. However, this experience was of short duration. A wave of arbitrary controls interrupted the initially smooth operation of postcolonial higher education institutions. In many places, repressive state influence developed. Regulations were issued according to the specific political regimes of individual states. The administration of universities was downgraded to a branch of the public service. Nigeria was massively affected by this experience. At the universities of Ibadan, Ile-Ife, and Lagos, political interference by federal politicians and state officials caused ethnolinguistic divisions to widen. These led to unprecedented hostility and bitterness that continue to this day. In Nigeria, it has become normal for university lecturers and staff to go on strike. Between 1999 and 2023, more than 1,300 working days were lost due to strikes by the “Academic Staff Union of Universities” (ASUU).

Struggles for academic freedom and university autonomy in Africa are characterized by contradictions. Scholars’ efforts to assert independence against the dictates of their governments stand in fundamental contradiction to their simultaneous dependence on the state, which provides the lion’s share of their funding. This contradiction is expressed in the unions’ rejection of the government’s intention to raise high tuition fees to finance public universities and pay globally competitive salaries for university lecturers. Academic unions in Nigeria and elsewhere continue to advocate for academic freedom and tuition-free education, while despairing at the material conditions of public universities. The low priority that many African governments give to higher education has worsened the situation. There has long been a lack of communication between unions and the state.

In a follow-up contribution, Arowosegbe highlights that the ongoing violations of academic freedom and numerous violent conflicts in Nigeria also severely affect the private universities – that are sometimes celebrated as saviours. Renowned scholars and brilliant students have little interest in taking a position or studying at these institutions, but at best engage in data collection, field research, or other minor collaborations. Arowosegbe asserts that only a few of his Nigerian colleagues are interested in scientific excellence. Instead, ‘they line up and intrigue for positions – as deans, directors, pro-rectors, and vice-chancellors.’ Apart from their ‘opportunistic access to company cars, the awarding and setting of contracts, and other kickbacks from their lucrative inactivity,’ there is no justified explanation for the ruthless pursuit of administrative and political power at state universities.

Other contributions are included from Toyin Falola, who urges using digital technologies and innovative educational models, and proposes various financing models, such as foundations and public-private partnerships and alumni funding. Sola Akinrinade is concerned about shrinking state funding of the humanities in Nigeria, and calls for advancing the relevance of the disciplines and their crucial contribution to understanding and solving social problems.

Anna Mdee notes that Arowosegbe’s remarks could be read as overly gloomy and ignorant of the dynamics and growth of higher education in Africa – as a relapse into old prejudices against an Africa regarded as ‘incapable’ and ‘hopeless’. The vitality of some African elite institutions and capitals, however, conceals growing global inequality. Workshops in Lagos, Accra, and Nairobi produce plans, strategies, and guides for a different university, yet all too often remain wishful thinking. Against this background, the ruthless, historically informed assessment of the current situation penned by African scholars is a first, indispensable step.

ANDREAS ECKERT

This is a revised and abridged version of an article that appeared in German on 8 April 2026 in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, p. N4, under the title “Der Staat ist das größte Freiheitshindernis” (“The State is the Greatest Obstacle to Freedom”).

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