Encomium
Chairman, Globacom Limited, Dr. Mike Adenuga was on Thursday honoured with the Distinguished Old Students Award of his Alma Mater, Ibadan Grammar School.
The awards ceremony was part of the Third Venerable Emmanuel Alayande Memorial Lecture and Awards of the school which clocks 101 years next week. Other awardees included the Alake of Egbaland, Oba Adedotun Gbadebo; Professor Akin Mabogunje, Mr Goodie Ibru, Senator Ken Nnamani, Senator Femi Lanlehin, Honourable Justice Badejoko Olateju; Chief Judge of Oyo State and Honourable Justice Ayotunde Adeyoola Phillips, Chief Judge of Lagos State.
Dr Adenuga’s award was received on his behalf by Dr Seyi Roberts, an old boy of the school who was also an awardee on the occasion.
Justice Phillips who delivered the lecture titled Law And The Education Of A Nation: Nigeria In Perspective, identified issues of policy inconsistency, poverty, weak or inadequate public enlightenment, lack of funding, poor infrastructure, lack of science and laboratory equipment and the application of the quota system as some of the factors militating against education in the nation.
Others, according to her, include inadequate number of teachers, lack of motivation for teaching and non teaching staff, religious and cultural indoctrination, recent impact of terrorism and debilitating effects of corruption which has permeated all endeavours of life in Nigeria.
To this extent, she advocated private sector participation in education in order to secure the future of the youth of the country while calling on alumni associations to participate in the administration of schools through the setting up of trust funds which will assist a great deal in the provision of qualitative education for students.
She eulogised Dr Mike Adenuga for donating an ICT Centre which is reputed to be the best in the country to Ibadan Grammar School.
Earlier, the President of the Alumni Association, Professor Charles Aworh had described Dr Adenuga as one of the most illustrious old students of the school who had impacted the institution in a myriad of ways. He said providence will always be fair to the business guru each time the facility is used by successive sets of students of the school.
