With a scholarly career spanning Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria; the University of Abuja and now Veritas University, Abuja, it is not surprising the birthday wishes are coming from too many quarters for Prof I.E.S Amdi, the incumbent Dean of the Faculty of Social Sciences, Veritas University, Abuja. It is a tribute to a member of that generation in academia..
Dr. Yusuf Bangura, the veteran political economist who worked with Prof Amdi at ABU, Zaria in that university’s heydays wondered recently how it happened that he never knew him more than his surname: Amdi. Typical of that generation, Prof Amdi is not one who projects a person-centred visibility. Rather, he lets the Other speaks and he searches for the common ground. And the procedure must be followed.
He will defend you to the last point if you follow the procedure. You will only find yourself alone if you didn’t. For instance, he doesn’t argue with you that the Vehicle Inspection Officers are everywhere nowadays or the Federal Road Safety Corps operatives or such sundry road managers known and unknown to the law. He agrees anybody could be held up by any of them anytime, any day. But could a staff under such condition call the Dean or the HoD to update him so that he can be accounted for in terms of lateness or absence? If you do that and honestly too, he is with you. If you couldn’t, you are on your own. Simple but, at the same time, complex..
With zero tolerance for viciousness, for manipulation, for gossiping against anyone in front of him or for what Hausa language calls chua-chua, he is ageing gracefully, again typically. Typically because when one met one of them, be it the University of Ibadan, Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria or the University of Nigeria, Nsukka or University of Port Harcourt, it is like meeting all of them.
Prof Alex Gboyega who died last Wednesday, (January 12th, 2022) at 79 is one of them. He worked hard and was generally above manipulative leadership in his own field. Prof Asisi Asobie of the Department of Political Science at the University of Nigeria Nsukka was the exemplar in that university in this regard. And the list could go on.
They collectively pose a question for critical social science and the question is this: if the individual is not an integrated whole with one solid identity that is formed once and for all, how come is this observable generational pattern of behavior the case?
Intervention joins others to wish Prof Amdi many more years of active academic leadership!.
