In the next few weeks, starting from today, this column will be surrendered to my boss; my mentor; citizen of many worlds; a prolific writer and, of recent, a preacher of the Gospel, His Excellency, Prof. Okon E. Uya, to speak outside the ivory tower directly to the people of Akwa Ibom State and beyond. Development in our society may be stimulated by various means, but there is no disputing the criticality of ideas and the seeming passive roles of the men who create, nurture and propagate such ideas by promise. On April 24, 2009, he delivered the University of Uyo Convocation Lecture. It is re-served here because of its enduring relevance and unrelenting freshness.

The Military Era
The above tradition was completely subverted during the era of military rule in Nigeria. Whatever its merits, military rule was avowedly anti-intellectual characterized by open hostility towards progressive intellectuals, some of whom were jailed, cajoled into submission or driven into exile.
An incident in the University of Ibadan in 1967 when the then Head of State, Col. Yakubu Gowon came to visit served notice on what the intellectual class was to expect from the military rulers. We had gathered in great numbers to jubilate and wecome the new young ruler. In our enthusiasm to support the new direction that promised to uproot the ills of the Nigerian society tribalism, corruption , blundering political leadership etc, we requested that the military should issue a decree that would allow students of the university to have military training, so we could join in defending the country. The Head of State's reply was cute and direct; “University of Ibadan students are dangerous enough without guns”. Obviously, the new rulers in uniform were not going to share power and authority with the intellectual class. This was the beginning of the alienation of the intellectual classes from governance. They were thenceforth treated with suspicion and fear by the rulers who would refer to us as “bloody civilians”, lost in theories and unaware of the practical aspects of governance. Of course, they were wrong and would from time to time selectively invite some intellectuals to assist in policy articulation, formulation and implementation and to serve as Ministers, Commissioners and so on. President Ibrahim Babangida was perhaps the most successful in this regard.
Ibrahim Babangida and His Intellectuals in Government
A man of messianic disposition who sought to control his environment by sheer force of character and a soldier with an intellectual bend, sometimes described as a soldier politician, Babangida openly courted the involvement of prominent Nigerian intellectuals in his determined effort to re-create a Nigerian state where good governance would be the order of the day. Convinced that “for our tomorrow, we need to sacrifice our today”, Babangida brought in intellectuals in large numbers into government in the hope that given their famed idealism, power of rigorous analysis and consensus building as well as their wealth of knowledge, they would contribute to his desire to build a new Nigeria where political contractors and political touts would no longer dominate the political scene and true politicians, men and women dedicated to politics as service and seeking to use power in the interest of the people (“the new breed”), would emerge. His programmes of social transformation, economic rejuvenation and redirection and political engineering required a large dose of intellectual input and he exercised his famed ability to identify intellectuals with social conscience and commitment to the public good. The names are many but only a few may be mentioned here: Professor Ojetunji Aboyade, an economist guru; Professor Wale Soyinka, a Noble Prize Winner in Literature; Professors Oye Oyediran, Isawa Elaigwu, Sam Oyovbaire, Adele Jinadu, Omo Omoruyi, Eme Awa, Humphrey Nwosu, George Obieaso, Tunde Adeniran, A. D. Yahaya, and Drs. Tunji Olagunju, Haroun Adamu and others, established political scientists; Professors Okon Uya, Jide Osuntokun, Ade Adefuye, and Dr. Dele Cole, prominent Nigerian historians, were brought into government in one capacity or the other. From what I know, Babangida openly sought the counsel of these men among whom he encouraged vigorous debates through many over-lapping layers to arrive at decisions he considered critical for the management of the nation.
We consider it inappropriate at this early stage to focus too extensively on the inner workings of this group since I was a major participant and actor in discussions touching such critical areas as the new political order, electoral processes, and diplomacy. At any rate, two of my colleagues who are not so protocol-minded to be bound by the ethics governing public disclosures about government activities in which they participated, Professors Omo Omoruyi (The Tale of June 12) and Humphrey Nwosu (Laying the Foundation for Nigeria's Democracy), have given graphic details of the many frustrations these academics went through in the hands of the military authorities in their determined effort to re-engineer the Nigerian state.
We must, however, comment on one important area which has become public acknowledged, the work of the Political Bureau, precisely because we strongly believe that had the military government accepted and implemented the major recommendations of the Bureau, our road to democracy and good governance, though still tortuous, would have been for less bumpy, and our country saved the many traumas that engulfed us between 1987 and 1999 and after. We have had occasion elsewhere to state that:
The challenges far the democratic project in Nigeria are: the creation and institutionalization of appropriate apparatus of democratic governance; the mobilization and the education of the citizenry, both civilian and military to an awareness of their rights, duties, responsibilities and obligations for the sustenance of democracy; and above all the welfare and well-being of Nigerian citizens.
The seventeen-man Political Bureau composed largely of prominent Nigerian intellectuals drawn from our Universities and other institutions including the media and women organizations, Cookey, was inaugurated by the Babangida administration in 1986 and charged with the responsibility of designing a new system of civilian government and the modalities for orderly and permanent disengagement of the military from intervention in governance. I participated very actively in the work of the Bureau, serving as Chairman of the sensitive and important Sub-committee on State Creation that recommended the creation of Katsina and Akwa Ibom States in 1987, as well as being the Rapporteur-General, who fine tuned the many drafts of the Report from the various Subcommittees to ensure uniformity and simplicity of presentation. The entire work of the Bureau was motivated by our conviction that what was required was a fundamental and comprehensive restructuring of our society in all its facets, especially the thirty issues identified for debate, and a consciousness that a well designed project could be improperly executed by those charged with its implementation.
From our terms of reference, the Bureau was indeed expected, in dialogue with Nigerians, to recommend ways of overhauling the entire institutions of governance in order to make them democratic and thus lead to good governance. We approached our assignment with relevant patriotic intellectual zeal and made recommendations touching every important area in the Nigerian democratic project; philosophy, structure, institutions, and political culture of governance, in the sincere conviction that if accepted and properly implemented, democracy would be firmly planted in the Nigerian soil.
Also, many of our most fundamental intellectually inspired recommendations, most notably our recommended philosophy of socialism mediated by capitalism; re-structuring of the country to ensure compliance with the minimum requirements for a federal structure, especially state and local government creation; massive reduction in the cost of governance and minimization of waste through inauguration of a regime of efficiency, integrity, public accountability and transparency, as well as the sanitization of the political environment, were either totally rejected or partially or inadequately grasped and implemented.