- counsels journalist on professionalism, ethical conduct
SUNRISE NEWS, Lagos, Sept 9, 2020 The Majority Leader of Lagos State House of Assembly, Hon. Sanai Agunbiade has lauded the Lagos State University LASU’s new ratings amongst universities in Nigeria, Africa and the world, linking the feat to the proactive step invention by the state House of Assembly.
Agunbiade made this assertion while in a chat with the executive members of Lagos State House of Assembly Correspondents’ Association (LAHACA) who paid him a courtesy visit in his office on Monday.
The elated Majority Leader while commenting on the World University Rankings 2021 by Times Higher Education where LASU was ranked,548th in the world,11th in Africa and 2nd in Nigeria, notes that the feat attained is due to a now stable academic environment in LASU.
He reminisced on the experience he had while he as LASU President of Student Union Government, had to take on his colleagues at the Obafemi Awolowo University in Ife where they verbally assaulted LASU and he had to assert that what they lacked in Infrastructure, they gained in intellectual capabilities.
“We need to commend Prof. Fagbohun the Vice Chancellor and his team for this, then, we should not also forget the initiative of the Lagos House of Assembly for amending LASU act to give a single term of five years to the Vice Chancellor.
The problem has always been about the tenure of the V.C, maybe the people within the campus community are not comfortable with a V.C for example, they will be wary of having the VC for another tenure in office and they start mobilising the staff unions, the students and the who is who in the university community against the VC, academic activities will become paralysed, school programmes disrupted.
These are the things the House saw before recommending a single term of five years for the VC, which has made the school to be stable.
Academic activities are now going on smoothly, quality research continues the citation and profile of the school continues to rise, leading to an improvement in the global image of the school, the result is what you have seen,” said Agunbiade.
He however, tasked LAHACA to be more professional in the discharge of their duties and to also stick to the ethics of their profession.
While congratulating the new Executive members, he promised to support the association in whatever way he could, while urging members of the association not to compromise the standard of their profession.
“I have always been a friend of the media, I love the media profession because it is a noble profession, maybe someday I may still have to go for a course in journalism at the Nigerian Institute of Journalism (NIJ) or elsewhere.
I remember when I was in secondary school, we formed the writers club, during my NCE days too, we started the Galaxy Press Club, as a student at the Lagos State University, we formed The SCAD which produced the first campus newspaper then”, he said.
The Majority Leader however said he sometimes move away from the media for fear of being misquoted. “Some of your fellow journalists, when you grant them an interview, they will go and add their own just to make it sensational, that is why I try to avoid the media sometimes because you can’t misquote silence.
We are ready to work with you as long as you remain professional, keep the integrity of your job intact because as a person I avoid anything that can come between me and my integrity”, he said.