By Prof Artwell Nhemachena
AFRICAN universities are operating in a world that is increasingly becoming xeno- phobic and Afrophobic.
This poses questions about the orientation which the universities should take.
Whereas universities, by their nature, should train for the local and global levels, the increasing xenophobia casts doubts on the global relevance of African universities when their graduates are excluded from global job markets on account of xenophobia.
When African universities train students for global relevance and then the global job market rejects them on account of xenophobia, this smacks of wastage of resources training people for a job market that rejects and excludes them. The global orientation of universities assumes that graduates will not be excluded and rejected on the global job market.
There is a paradox in that we are witnessing global orientations of African universities ironically in a world where there is increasing localising of job markets.
The US has been advocating building walls against Mexican immigrants; the US has been building Fortress America against immigrants; Europe has built Fortress Europe against immigrants; and even in some African countries there is xenophobia against foreign immigrants and job seekers.
Indeed, Europe has built fences, deployed drones, dogs and border guards against immigrants.
Yet, in the context of all this, Africans are asked to focus on training their students to solve global problems when ironically there is localisation of job markets everywhere in the world. The net effect is that there is localisation of benefits of education but there is globalisation of problems in the sense that African universities are asked to train students for solving global problems but they are excluded from benefitting from global job opportunities in a world that is increasingly becoming xenophobic and exclusionary.
There are cost implications when African universities spend money training students for solving global problems and the same graduates are then excluded from benefitting from global job oppor- tunities.
The question is: Why should Africans be included in finding solutions to global problems if they are not also included in benefitting from global job opportunities?
The problem becomes stark when African universities forego efforts and financing solutions to local problems while focusing on investing to find solutions
to global problems for which they do not get any benefits in terms of global employment opportunities. In other words, we are living in a paradoxical world that
opens up to everyone to invest in solving global problems and then ironically precludes them from benefitting from global opportunities.
The problem is that when a university invests in finding solutions to global problems it compromises its investments in finding solutions to local problems.
Yet, its graduates end up flooding the local job market, for which they are not prepared, when the global market rejects them in the face of mounting xenophobia. African universities should seriously consider the dynamics between the local and the global when they design curricula and when they actually train students, particularly given the mounting xenophobia in the world.
There is need to focus on local beneficiation of African minds so that they become more relevant to local African contexts. Whatever is done within an African university, the question of local beneficiation and relevance should be central.
Africa has some unique problems that demand for unique solutions – and if African universities do not invest in finding solutions to the unique problems that Africans face, no-one else will assist Africans find solutions.
African universities could start by mapping the unique problems that Africa has and then design curricula which put such unique problems at the centre of the universities’ investments of efforts, money and time. African countries have, for instance, unique challenges in the form of land redistribution to the majority, which cannot be reduced to a global problem.
African countries also have unique problems in terms of redistribution and ensuring majority ownership and access to mineral resources. Besides, Africans have unique problems in terms of reparations for enslavement and colonisation which have not been done in spite of centuries
of demands by their forebears. Without attending to the unique African problems, it is difficult to see how Africa can develop.
Yet these unique African problems are not central in African university curricula that focus on investing in finding solutions to the so-called global problems.
It is necessary to start by addressing unique local African problems in university curricula before addressing or investing in finding solutions to global problems.
If charity begins at home, then it follows, by extension, that one should begin by addressing problems at home before thinking of the global. The problem is that in Africa, there is inversion in that often African universities start by investing in addressing global problems while ignoring or parking investments in addressing local problems. Such an in-
version is colonial in effect in so far as it postpones or ignores addressing African local problems.
Africa is frozen in numerous problems because African universities have not prioritised investments in addressing unique African problems in their curricula.
African Ministers of Higher Education need to monitor African universities to ensure they prioritise addressing
unique African problems in their curricula. The relevance of African universities does not lie in their geographical situates in Africa but it lies in their prioritisation of addressing unique African problems on the continent.
Of course, even in the case of the so-called global problems, Africans need to seriously and deeply unpack them to see if they are really global or they are local to some countries but projected as global in order to exploit others.
Put differently, if Africans in the then Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland rejected the horse and rider relationship proposed by the colonialists of that time, Africans should also reject horse and rider relationships in the so-called global arena where the Global North could ride on Africans as if on their horses. Problems that are local to some countries in the world can very easily be projected as global problems in order to mobilise everyone else and to exploit them in finding or contributing to solutions.
If African universities focus on investing in addressing local unique African problems, Africa will be able to solve problems that have troubled it for centuries. But to invest in addressing unique problems in Africa, it is necessary to locally beneficiate African minds.
But such beneficiation of African minds requires not only transforming the curricula but also investing in writing and publishing books that are relevant and that speak to unique African problems. It also requires Vice-Chancellors who are equal to the task, that is, who are themselves locally beneficiated – and who know where to focus in their investments.
It is baffling that Africa has so many unresolved problems in spite of the existence of so many African universities and so many African academics bearing the highest credentials, including from overseas. The core function of an African university should be to invest in addressing problems that are local and unique to Africans. Otherwise, Africans risk focusing on investing in solving other people’s problems in the mistaken belief that they are global and deserve preferential investments in African university curricula.
African Ministers of Higher Education need to set up rigorous committees and boards to ensure relevance and beneficiation in African universities. African political leaders cannot solve African problems alone. They need African universities to invest in finding solutions to the problems that are uniquely African. Academics who are paid to think and find solutions to problems that are African should do their part.
African communities and governments have invested in training African academics – and so, African academics need to invest in finding solutions to problems that are uniquely African in order to give back to the communities.
The problem is that many African academics have tended to mistake critical thinking with criticising their own societies, political leaders and cultures. Yet what real critical thinkers do is to critically address unique problems that afflict their communities and leaders so that together they can make progress. Of course, Western critical theories have wrongly taught Africans that a critical thinker is one who criticises and deconstructs his or her own society, culture and leaders.
