Professor G.O Olatunde was our VeeCee from October 2017 to October 2022. The first time I heard some of my colleagues referring to him as the GO, I was aghast: How can academics be so pusillanimous as to refer to another academic( even though he was the VC) as GO, a term used in the Pentecostal world to describe owner-founders who can do, misdo, counter-do and undo? For one, OOU is not a privately owned religious outfit. Secondly, the VC, working within the confines of regulations, policies, and long established academic culture, and under the bumper-to-bumper marking by various groups, including ASUU, cannot do, mis-do, counter-do and undo! However, I calmed down when I learnt the GO just happened to be his initials and I further discovered that because of his personal dispositions, people were glad to call him the GO. By the time I got closer to him, I gladly joined others in calling him the GO, a term I still use for him up to this moment. GO is also a Comrade because he was a one-time Zonal Coordinator of ASUU, which made him a die-hard ASUUist and that was why throughout his tenor, he never gave us any reason to go into the ‘we-no-go-gree’ mode! That was understandable as he knew the written and unwritten rules of the game; after all, he had been fully involved. I added another moniker, The Magician, when he was able to pay our salaries regularly -and completely-throughout the ‘Covidious’ triple-locks (lock up. Lock down and lock in) and the just concluded 8 months ASUU ‘akshon’., when the salaries of most of our colleagues were NGIGErised So, I used to call him Prof, VC, GO, Comrade and later, Magician! And he would just call me Oga-Muo! How can I be Oga to a whole VC and GO?
I was an ordinary member of the university
community but he has been my friend since 2019, when I had the first encounter with him. In the second quarter of 2019, there was an
avalanche of suicides by teenagers (mostly university students)
caused by academic challenges and failed romance. We did not have that
unfortunate experience at OOU but I was afraid
that given the pervasive influence of the social-media and the consequential herd-tendencies,
it might well happen in our campuses. I
was convinced that we needed a suicide-prevention awareness programme. However,
the issue was how I would go about it. I considered ‘marketing’ the idea to my HOD or the Dean so that it would become a
Departmental or Faculty programme, but the reach and impact would have been limited. However, in order to give it a
university-wide impact, I decided to discuss the matter with our ‘GO’, whom I
had not met before then. So one day, after an inaugural lecturer, I accosted
him, introduced myself and told him that I wanted to have an audience with him to discuss issues of ‘urgent
national importance’. He said ‘Dr Muo, I have heard about you ( Ha!What
did they tell him about me?) and I also would like to see you’. We agreed to meet later that day and given
my worries about protocol complexities in such high offices, he directed one of
his staff to ensure that I had direct access. You see, since I joined OOU in 2004, I had
visited the VC’s office on three occasions only.
At
the appointed time, I went to his office where I was warmly received, discussed
my worries about the rampaging teenage suicide, suggested a university-wide programme,
gave him a brief description of the process and, he bought the idea 100%. He
invited the Dean of Students’ Affairs there and then, asked us to design the
programme (structure, content, speakers, duration and logistics) and get back
to him immediately. The programme was designed and executed
between July 30th and August 5th 2019 in all our campuses with the theme as ‘Suicide
is NOT an Option’. The title of my paper was ‘You are not alone
and… It shall come to pass’. Some of my colleagues still call me ‘suicide
is not an option’ up to present
day. Because of his accessibility,
friendly disposition, humility and
openness to advice, I became his regular guest and had several other encounters
with him, subject to his time-constraints. One day, I met a hawker in my class
and wondered why the particular hawker was
so bold as to still remain in class after I had entered. I was touched when I learnt that the hawker
was a student. Who sustained herself at OOU by hawking. I invited the student
for a chat, gave her a little handshake and raised the matter with the VC, who granted her audience , gave her a personal and bigger
handshake and promised to see how the school would help. In another instance, I
saw a student walking the long distance to
the OOU gate under an
oppressively hot weather. As the spirit
directed, I gave him a lift and learnt
that he was trekking not to the gate but
to his to his residence, about 6kms from
the school, because of acute pocketities. I also sent the student
to the GO just as I sent about 4 other distressed students to him in the period BC( Before
Coro!). What delighted him most was that
these students were in dire stress and were not related to me in any way. I also recall one day when our students were
stranded because the transporters went on strike. I ferried the few I could in my tuke-tuke
(they destroyed the handle of my car when they were struggling to enter)suggested
that he released the high capacity school
busses, and probably acquire more so as to
put an end to that type of sabotage. He responded that while that made
sense for the students, he would not like to put the troublesome petty-drivers
off the road and thus into the unemployment market and into poverty. Compassion at its highest!
Throughout this period, I NEVER
made ANY personal request from him. We were discussing issues
that would favour the students or the system. From the way he handled all these
issues, his enviable predispositions shone like a thousand stars in a dark
night. He was humble, polite, considerate , respectful, inclusive and friendly.
He was very concerned about the welfare of the students; he values and acts on advice and he was
appreciative. During one of the schools congregation,
he acknowledged me as one of those who contributed to the success of his
administration. Me? I wondered what I had done to merit that executive commendation but that is the GO for you.
He was also a good team player as he
always stressed the support of his team-members in his transformational
leadership strides. I also assumed that his high level of emotional intelligence were
extended to other citizens and
stakeholders of OOU. It was very difficult to know he was the VC, whether he
was in his car or in his legedeze-benz. I have seen VCs with
platoons of kill-and-go policemen!
Well,
there is time for everything (Ecclesiastes,3:1-11) including a time to bow out.
And so, at the appointed time, the GO had to leave and he bowed out gloriously.
For one, the ASUU-OOU organised a
send-forth ceremony for him. If you are
not in the system, you will not understand the import of this. As par tradition,
ASUU only releases end-of-tenure report-cards for VCs. They do not engage in
praise-singing while one is in charge, even though they can say enough is
enough if need be! In a good number of cases, the reports are full
of red marks, with ‘F’s all over the place. In the case of our GO however,
ASUU-OOU awarded him distinctions
in all spheres. Why not? Among others, he paid our salaries during the lockdown and the strike. This is important
because we are ‘self-employed’; we have to be on duty so as to
generate IGRs and pay ourselves and so,
whenever the school is closed, the money-tap is closed.( Don’t ask me
about the miserable subvention from the
government, half of which they take as taxes from the staff) But he
managed to pay! Of course, his
predecessor, Professor Saburi, who started the reinvention of OOU, had advised
him thus: ‘do not toy with their salaries’
On
Wednesday, 23/11/22 it was the turn of the entire community to bid him
farewell. And because GO always admired my red-cap,(my unmistakable
identity-statement), I went to the ceremony with a special one; the elongated model, which I use for special
occasions. It was the first time I wore it at OOU. There were testimonies upon
testimonies from OOU citizens and members of the Ago-Iwoye community whose
lives were touched officially and privately by the GO. The security-men,
students, academic and non- academic staff, transporters, business people within OOU, all had something wonderful to
say about the GO. This showed him as a genuine Man of the People.
His records in the spheres of process-automation, online-lectures,
accommodation for students, compliance with the rule of law, equity and
fairness, security, landscaping and beautification, academic development and
programme accreditation, staff and students welfare were once more x-rayed and
it was all obvious that he came, saw, conquered, and placed OOU
on a path that would be very difficult to reverse. Luckily, he was succeeded by
one of our own, Professor Ayodeji Agboola, who was the Immediate-Past Chief ASUUist
at OOU, the immediate past DVC
(Academic) and a part of the current success story. There were gifts from the
University and its various organs but I
was the only ordinary citizen to present a farewell gift to him and what was in
the pack? My latest book (Oga Coro(
Covid-19; the Good, The Bad, the Ugly & the messy( Ik Muo, 2022), which
I completed during the strike) and an executive pen, the type fit for performing executives like him because I
believed that he would need in in a higher capacity one of these days.
The
book which I wrote during the lockdown of 2020(Project Writing,
Presentation and defense: a Hands-on approach) was dedicated solely to him.
I don’t know whether he was or is aware, because we never discussed it and he never mentioned
it. In that dedication, I described him as The GO, an inclusive, compassionate, bonhomie and hands-on
technocrat, a comrade and a generalising specialist. That summarizes my assessment of him. What I
forgot to add was a jolly good fellow! I wish the GO the best in
his future endeavours. I also wish the
new VC, Professor Deji Agboola (we will soon get an appropriate sobriquet for
him!) the best and pray that OOU can only grow bigger and better as the years
bye
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