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The news of renaming Kogi State University after the late political heavyweight, Prince Abubakar Audu received the loudest and widest encomium across the state and party divide. The executive governor of Kogi state, His Excellency Alh Yahaya Bello in a broadcast on 10th June, 2016 announced the renaming of the state university after Prince Abubakar Audu, who established the university in 1999 as a way of immortalising the late political icon.
Though the decision was welcomed and viewed as fulfilling the heart desire of the late politician whose original plan of the university was jettisoned by his successor, Alhaji Idris Ibrahim, Audu intended to implementing the plan when he assume office before death came calling.
On establishment in 1999, Kogi State University originally has decentralization of the University in the master plan. The Kogi state university main campus will be located at Anyigba, while School of Medicine and College of Engineering located at Obangede in Kogi Central and Kabba in the Kogi West zone respectively. This well thought out master plan could not see the light of it implementation before the regime of late Prince Abubakar Audu was truncated by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in 2003.
The PDP government under the leadership of former governor Ibrahim Idris threw this master plan under his carpet throughout his tenure. Besides, a lot of anomalies in the good intention of late Prince Abubakar Audu were jettisoned. One of such is Mahmud Attah Senate building which Ibro government removed.
Today, school of medicine has been established by the Wada administration and is located in the main campus at Anyigba. This singular act negate the original plan of the white paper establishing the university.
I call on the state governor, Alh Yahaya Bello to quickly, as a matter of importance, complete the chain of immortalization by fulfilling the heart desire of late Prince Abubakar Audu.
I suggest that, College of medicine and school of engineering should be relocated/located to the original location as embedded in the master plan. The governor should demand for the act establishing Kogi state university where these arrangement was inculcated as handed over to former governor Idris Ibrahim for proper implementation.
That the governor should revert all the original names of edifice in the campus as implemented by the late political icon, Prince Abubakar Audu.
If this is done, the government will be adjudged the best that has happened to Kogi state since creation. The government of Alh Yahaya Bello must sustain this good and solid foundation he has began. The new direction government of his Excellency Alh Yahaya Bello has shown clearly that it is no longer business as usual and we call on this new direction government to implement the Kogi state master plan through a holistic decentralization of the institution.
– Lawal O. James
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