What Remained Of The Higher College Was Renamed Yaba Technical Institute To Give Practical Expression To The New Technical Education Development Plan. Technical Education Was Then A Novelty In The Country And The Government Had To Bring Together Various Training Centres Being Run By Public Departments To Form The Yaba Technical Institute. Such Centres Included The Lands And Survey Training Centre Which Started In 1908, Marine In 1928, The P.W.D. In 1931, The Post And Telegraphs Also In 1931 And The Railways In 1942.
Why Did Our Colonial Masters Give Engineering Education A Separate And Distinct Development Plan? Why Was A Faculty Of Engineering Not Introduced Along With Other Disciplines At The Inception Of Ibadan University College? Different People Have Different Ways Of Looking At These Question, But With The Benefit Of A Hindsight, Two Reasons Can Now Be Positively Adduced. In The First Place If The University Of Ibadan Had To Turn Out Graduate Engineers In The Early Fifties, There Would Have Been No Industries To Absorb Such Graduates. Secondly And Most Importantly, However, Such Modus Operandi Would Have To Run Counter To Established British Tradition In The Development Of Education.
In Early Days In Britain, Every Student Engineer Starts His Career By First Receiving A Sound Practical Training Under Factory Conditions, And Progresses Along Professional Ladder Depending On Individual Talent, Intellect And Interest. The Situation Was Such That Nobody Graduated To A Professional Engineer Without Indomitable Bent In The Practicals.
Even After The Second World War, Britain Adopted Massive Training Of Engineering Personnel Through Full-Time, Part-Time Evening/Day Release Courses In Technical Colleges To Make-Up For Shortage Of Manpower In Engineering Industries Leading To ONC/OND Qualifications In Engineering With Sound Practical Know-How. The British Track Of Development Was Undoubtedly What Our Colonial Masters Envisaged In Their Ten-Year Technical Education Progranmme For Nigeria. Certainly, In Ten Years, With Little Attention, The Yaba Technical Institute Would Have Been Ripe Enough To Turn Out Its First Batch Of Authentic Nigerian Engineers Trained To The 1st Degree Level While At The Same Time Providing Enough Manpower At The Middle-Level Cadre. This Is In Fact The Practice In Britain And Throughout Europe.
However, In The Nigerian History, Which Is Now Being Reviewed, Partly Because Our Colonial Masters Saw Africa Foremost As Raw Materials Workshop, And Partly Due To Our Own Defective Sense Of Appreciation. Technical Education Was Never Developed In Nigeria.
Yaba Technical Institute Was Allowed To Suffer A Slow And Emaciated Growth. Ten Years Went By, But Nothing Was Again Heard Of The Ten-Year Development Plan. The Attitude Ran Through A Span Of Almost One And Half Decades, And Up To The Dawn Of Our Independence.
Immediately, After Independence A Floodgate Of University Campuses Was Thrown Open, With The University Of Lagos Coming Into Existence By An Act Of Parliament In 1960. Nsukka, Ahmadu Bello University And Ife Followed In Quick Succession. Nigerians Had Known The Pride Of Wearing Academic Robe In Law And Theology But They Seemed To Have Totally Forgotten That In Engineering, The Hood Does Not Make The Monk.
Indeed, All The Universities Came Up With Facilities In Engineering, Thus Bringing An Upsurge Of Entrants Into Engineering Profession At The Graduate Level. Two Things Had Immediately Gone Wrong. In Less Than Ten Years After Independence, The Nation Was Already Filled With Graduate Engineers Who Were In Actual Fact No More Than Science Boys - Because In The Words Of Professor Terry, “Nobody Ever Learnt Engineering From A Book Anymore Than That A Person Ever Acquired The Art Of Swimming Or Bicycling Theoretically In An Armchair”.
Second Wrong Thing Was The Irony Of Building A House From Roof Top. As It Were, Nigeria Had Succeeded In Building An Economy With The Apex Of Technical Manpower Cadre Overcrowded, And The Middle Level None-Existent. Soon, Questions Were Being Raised About The Quality Of Locally Trained Engineers, While The Dearth Of Middle Level Manpower Was Embarrassingly Acute.
Government Started Looking For Solutions. Everybody Knew Quite Well That Solution Lies In Restructuring Our System Of Engineering Education; But From Where Do We Start? Suddenly, It Appeared The Policy Makers Decided That The Solutions Start And End With Restructuring The Old Yaba Technical Institute But Which Had By 1963 Metamorphosed Into Yaba College Of Technology. Many Reasons Were Advanced:-
Firstly, Records Showed That The Yaba Technical Institute At Its Inauguration In 1948 Was Intended To Produce The Middle Level Man-Power Requirements Of The Country. The First Solution To Solving The Problem Of Middle Level Manpower Shortage Therefore Is To Keep ‘Yaba’ Well Within Its Defined Objectives Of Over 30 Years Back.
This View Was Sold To Government, And It Was Generously Accepted. There Seemed To Be No Single Person To Recall That A Ten-Year Technical Education Development Plan Should At The Close Of The Planned Period Be Able To Produce Very High Level Technological Manpower.
Secondly, Having Regards To The Nation’s Poor Technological Performance, The Source Was Almost Certainly Traced Again To The College Of Technology Curriculum. Various Papers Were Presented To Show That Yaba Boys Were Doing Too Much Theory. This Has To Be Cut To Size While Emphasis Must Be On The Practical Skills.
The Arguments Were As Maliciously Unsound As They Were Curiously Illogical, But Yet They Held Sway. In Retrospect, It Would Seem So Strange That In All This, The University Engineering Curriculum Was Left Severely Alone. In The Ostensible Quest For Solution To Acute Shortage Of Middle Level Manpower, Hilarious And Rather Effective Propaganda Was Mounted To Ensure That All Products Of Yaba College Of Technology At Whatever Level Were Tagged Middle-Level Manpower.
Technology Students Stood Against All The Onslaught. Very Bold And Daring Attacks Were Actually Launched To Destroy The New Enviable Status Of The Institution, But It Was Like Trying To Obliterate Mounts Olympus From The Surface Of The Earth - For The 1968 College Of Technology Graduates Are Definitely Not The Same As The 1948 Pioneers; Not Only Have They Now The Right Training, But Theirs Is A Professional Struggle And They Have Fought It To The Surface.
Indeed, Technological Education Had Already Taken A Firm And Solid Shape In Nigeria. The Old Yaba Technical Institute Has Yielded Place To Technical Colleges As The Main Centres For The Production Of Middle-Level Manpower; And It Equally Turns Out A Cream Of Ordinary Diploma Graduates In The Middle Level Cadre. The Higher Diploma Which Is Now The Highest Qualification Being Awarded Had Been Hard Worn And The Battle To Retain And Enhance It Continues Till This Day.
It Has To Be Recalled That The Renaming Of Yaba Technical Institute As Yaba College Of Technology In 1963 Was Itself Not Done Until A Very Hot Students’ Agitation. The Renaming Brought In Its Wake The Enrolment Of Students For The Higher Technician Diploma Of The City And Guilds Of London.
Still In Research Of Progress, Yaba Students Went On Strike Again In 1969 Calling For The Abrogation Of The Higher Technician Diploma And Autonomy For The College. In July 1969, Decree No. 23 Was Promulgated After Students’ Agitation Which Necessitated Shutting Down The Institution For Five Weeks! The Old Technical Institute Has At Last Graduated Into Motherhood.
Section 1 (A) Of Decree 23 Of July 1969 States:-
“To Provide Courses Of Instruction, Training And RESEARCH In Applied Science, Technology, Commerce, Management, And Such Other Field Of Learning As The Council May From Time To Time Determine”.
A Comparison Of Decree 23 Of 1969 Which Re-Established The Yaba College Of Technology With The University Of Lagos Decree 3 Of 1967 Is Quite Revealing:-
1 (3) The Objects Of The University Shall Be:-
1 (3) (B) “To Provide Courses Of Instruction And Other Facilities For The Pursuit Of Learning In All Its Branches, And To Make Those Facilities Available On Proper Terms To Such Persons As Are Equipped To Benefit From Them”.
1 (3) (C) “To Encourage, Promote And Conduct Research In All Fields Of Learning And Human Endeavor”
The Decree 23 Of 1969 Was Nothing But A Fulfillment Of The Philosophy That Gave Birth To Polytechnic Education The World Over And It Was Indicative Of The Level Of Technological Development In Post-Independence Nigeria.
In The Early 70’S, Many Of The Product Of Yaba College Of Technology Graduated With H.N.D. Certificates Were Accepted And Worked In Companies As Engineers. In Those Days Also After The Nigerian Civil War, Developments Was Going On In All Aspects Of The Nation’s Economy, And As Such, The Early Professional Returnees From The U.K. And Other Oversea Countries Established Consultancy Firms In The Country With H.N.D. /H.N.C. Holders From The U.K. And Yaba College Of Technology Employed In Their Firms As Engineers, And Were Performing Creditably Well.
Soon After, Council Of Registered Engineers Of Nigeria (COREN) Was Established, And Was Then Strongly Believed It Was Through The Assistance Of Members Of Nigerian Society Of Engineers. This Belief Was Soon Confirmed When COREN Decree Of 1970 Was Obtained, With Newspaper Publications Coupled With Direct Letters To Government Ministries And Companies, Limiting Only Holders Of B.Sc. Qualifications To Be Employed As Engineers.
That Action Was Seen As Discriminations Against Graduates Of Colleges Of Technology And Polytechnics.
NAPS CONDEMN HND DISCRIMINATION
NAPS DEMAND NATIONAL POLYTECHNICS COMMISSION
NAPS CALLS FOR PARITY OF HND AND BSC HOLDERS
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