NOUN names Centre for Good Governance after former President Olusegun Obasanjo

Olusegun Obasanjo

The National Open University of Nigeria (NOUN) says the inaugural lecture for its Olusegun Obasanjo Centre for Good Governance will be delivered by the former president on May 2 at Yar’adua Centre, Abuja.

NOUN’s Vice-Chancellor, Professor Abdalla Adamu, who disclosed while addressing newsmen on Thursday, said that the centre was named after Obasanjo in order to immortalise him for his rare achievements and for reviving NOUN.

The vice-chancellor said that the essence of setting up the centre was to facilitate research toward achieving excellence in good governance and development in Nigeria. He added that President Muhammadu Buhari would be the special guest of honour, while former Ghanaian President, John Mahama and former Chief Justice of Nigeria Aloma Mukhtar would co-chair the occasion.

“The Centre for Good Governance and Development was named after Obasanjo because he resuscitated NOUN in 2003 after it was abandoned in 1984. It was our honour and privilege to request from him that we name the centre after him and he obliged; we appealed to him to deliver the first lecture of the centre and he accepted. He is currently pursuing his Ph.D in NOUN; he is not pursuing it because he needs money or job but because he needs knowledge,’’ he said.

Professor of criminology, Abdullahi Shehu who is also the director of the Olusegun Obasanjo Centre for Good Governance said that the centre was to immortalise Obasanjo for his contributions to good governance. He said the choice of Obasanjo was because of the fact that he acknowledged that corruption was pervasive and proceeded to make efforts to curb it during his regime by establishing many anti-corruption commissions such as Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC), Financial Intelligence Unit and Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) which is the first of its kind in Nigeria.

He concluded that activities of the centre would be more of research and psychological than being a watchdog.