‘Bayo O”Yemi worked as a journalists for several years before he veered into the academics. He is currently the Head of the music department, Mountain Top University, MTU Ogun State
MTU is a Faith Based University owned by the Mountain of Fire and Miracles Ministries, led by Dr Daniel K, Olukoya.
With over 30 years in music academy and scholarship Bayo O’Yemi displays tremendous skills scholarship in the advancement of music education and performance in the country.
O’Yemi is reputed to have grown the MTU department from the scratch to great heights. The department now, awards degrees up to the Ph.D. level under his headship.
A graduate of Music at the Obafemi Awolowo University Ile Ife, O’Yemi also possesses Post graduate Diploma in Management Studies from the same University before proceeding to the University of Lagos for his Masters in Music and Doctor of Philosophy in Music, where he specialized in Ethnomusicology.
‘Bayo O’Yemi’s research interest is in African musicology, Performance, Music business and Music theory. He has been published both at home and abroad. He has also attended seminars and symposia both home and abroad where he focused his presentation on the Music of the Yoruba people in the new age.
Apart from being lecturer he is also a music Consultant. In this interview with Church Times, he gives an insight into the running of faith-based university and how the universities have been a great blessing to Nigeria
How did you come about lecturing at the MTU despite your many years in journalism?
I did not plan to lecture at all. By the time I was through with my PhD, I was planning to go back to journalism. But then I had cause to visit MTU for a project and discovered the school was planning to start a music department. One thing led to the other and i got hooked to the school. I have come to believe that my sojourn in the university is a fulfilment of God’s purpose. I discovered that the university environment is a fulfilling one. Today, I have students who have passed through me and are now doing their postgraduate studies in Oxford and Yale. And they are doing well. I have students who passed through my tutelage who earn more than me the orchestra where they work. Those are things that give me joy as a lecturer. The MFM environment has been a fulfilling one for me.
Apart from being the HOD of Music are there other things you do for the university?
I have been in the university for close to 8 years now. Out of the 8 years I have been the head of department for five years. I have relate closely with the chancellor, Dr Daniel Olukoya. Jokingly I always say the chancellor is the head of the Music department because he has a lot of interest in Music. I have also related quite well with the school authority.
You joined the university when it was just starting. How was it at the beginning?
It was actually challenging at the beginning. Being a faith-based university, the first set of students were drawn from the church largely. In our department we started with five students. It was problematic. The lecturer must be there even if the students were not many. The school was well prepared for the task ahead. There were more than enough facilities on ground. Before NUC would give approval for any department, the basic facilities have to be there. They check the resources available and ensure that the staff strength can cope with the number of students. As a matter of fact, NUC stipulates the number of students for admission based on available facility. So, we did not have issues getting accreditation for the course.
New universities are often accused of not having enough qualified staff. What is the experience of MFM in that regard?
It is easy for people who are not in the system to make conjectures. But this is how it works. The basic number of staff must be on ground before NUC will approve any course. They also give room for part-time lecturers which is what is allowed globally. That is why it is called university. Different universities are allowed to interact with each other. Even when you have enough lecturers, the university still would want you to do a sabbatical so that you can learn what obtains on another campus so that such lessons can be applied on your campus. So, there is no crime having part time lecturers. But we still have the basic number of staff as full time on ground before any course can be approved.
Some believe it’s easy-to-get admission in private universities compared to government owned universities. How true is this?
The truth is that the number of universities in Nigeria for now is grossly inadequate. Unfortunately, many people think we have too many universities. At the last count, the total number of students in private universities in Nigeria is not up to 10 percent of those in public universities. So, we need more universities. When a parent is taking decision of where their wards would go for tertiary education, there are lots of factors they consider. It is not true that private universities take the dregs. Some parents want their wards to go to private universities because of accessibility.
They don’t want their wards to go far for security reason. So many parents also want their children to remain in the faith environment. We have cases of students who were challenged in public universities on moral grounds who were withdrawn by their parents to faith-based universities so they could be straightened up by these universities. They know the basic things they do is eat, attend lecturers, read, and attend chapel. They also know they don’t enjoy the luxury of moving out of campus anyhow. The level of concentration is high. It is true some students who don’t get admission to public universities come to the privately owned universities as a last resort. But the truth again is that JAMB is not 100 percent correct in its assessment of students for admission.
For instance I was number 7 on the JAMB list, but ended up as the second-best student in my department back then in Ife. The trend has not changed. We have students who come into the university with weak JAMB scores but then they do very well in the course of their studies. This could be because of the kind of facilities available in private universities .
What is the experience of Mountain Top about students coming to faith-based universities because their parents want them to be straightened up?
I have heard and also know cases of parents who withdrew their wards from universities in Canada and the US and brought them to Mountain Top University because they believe when they get here, they will be exposed to godly values. The thing about faith-based university is that they are conscious of how people will perceive them. So, they do all they could to ensure their students are morally upright and at the same time intellectually sound. My chancellor spends a lot of money to ensure students get the best and at the same time are morally sound. We expose them to all that they need on campus to make them comfortable and prayerfully guide them towards a successful career.
How will you react to insinuations that many private universities are glorified secondary schools because of the way students who are suppose to be mature are being teleguided and restricted in their interactions with their colleagues and outsiders?
I think times have changed. You can’t compare 30 years ago in Nigeria with today. We were also of the age of those who enter campuses now compared with our own days. But the sociological factors have changed. There is global moral crisis that we can’t afford to ignore. The security situation is appalling. There are so many distractions among young people.
In MTU, we don’t allow use of phone but students have access to basic things like tabs, laptop that will help enhance their studies. Despite the restrictions we still see some of these students manipulate the tabs. In our days we knew why we were in school. But you can’t say that of today’s children. They are being dragged by a lot of social forces that are making them lose concentration. I also have kids in private university. My daughter did not like the idea of being censored. But by the time she was at the last year, she discovered that she was better off in a private university compared to those in public universities.
But don’t you face the danger of having graduates who begin to misbehave when they leave school because they were unnecessarily being censored while in school?
I agree with you. There are extreme cases. I believe you don’t tell a child not to touch a naked fire so the child could learn some lesson. But then, the four or five years spent under that moral restrictions go a long way to build in them some strength. Our findings reveal that they fall back to those teachings after their initial rebellion.
It is true some of them go haywire as soon as they leave school. But with time, the lessons they have been exposed to on campus which is like a seed grows in them. And a lot of them come back to the lessons. They come back to reality. I use to tell them when they are asked to go to the chapel, they are not asked to go there so they could pray for Olukoya but that they should go pray for themselves and learn lessons that will make them better in life. They meet people who are strong Christians and intellectuals and learn.
How will you react to allegations that faith-based universities are exploitative. The founders are often accused of using church money to start the university that many of their members can’t attend because of the exorbitant school fees?
When I read comments like that I just laugh because many don’t understand what it takes to run a university. Education is not cheap, particularly when it is being handled by a set of people. Apart from the structure, there are issues with curriculum and research. There is need to keep standard, and accommodation. We have light 24 hours, we have access to internet 24/7 and all kinds of expenses. In my department alone, the chancellor gave 25 full scholarships to kickstart the department. That means millions of naira coming from his purse every year. Apart from that the church itself has a scholarship board to help members. But they don’t talk about these things in the media. I can tell you that almost all the students that were admitted in the early years were on scholarship. They understand that church members need to access the facilities and they are doing a lot.
Perhaps churches should not have started universities if they know the cost is killing?
I think churches actually came to save the day getting involved in running universities. They have helped to remove a lot of burden from public universities and they should be commended for that. What we should know is that the church keeps pumping money into the university to maintain standard. If you look at it critically, I do not think funds in MTU is exorbitant. Students are given accommodation and they have access to 24-hour light and internet.
If you look at the tuition they pay and compare with public universities you will find out that the cost boils down to the same thing when compared to some public universities. In MTU a new intake would pay about 870k including one-off payments. By the time the person gets to part two the fee will come down. The university also allows a convenient payment system that allows parents to drop as little of N50k per month till the fees are paid up.
Students in public university also incur a lot of cost. The fees may be moderate, but some of them don’t get accommodation and end up renting apartment outside the school. They don’t have access to basic infrastructure. At the end of the day, if they add what they spend on data, on accommodation and light and other essentials it comes back to the same amount spent in some private universities. So by and large the fees in private universities especially faith-based varsities are moderate in comparative terms. I think one of the challenges of many private universities is that they don’t have many students that can pay off the cost of the facilities.
In many of the departments in MTU its like we are running a social service because the facilities are top notch. The admission requirement is as tough as we have in public universities. People complain that the private universities produce too many first-class graduates, but they don’t know some students are also being rusticated from these universities. In MTU there are students who are rusticated because they can’t meet up with the academic rigour. I can tell you that those who have first class in faith-based universities and indeed some other credible private universities deserve it. The simple reason it is easy for them to make first class is that students are saved from many distractions that their counterparts experience in public universities. Many public universities have as many as 12 students in a room. How on earth can they study well and come out with good grades in that condition? When you come to MTU as an average student, you won’t leave as average student.
You head the Music department. How do we reconcile your department with that of public university going by the fact that yours is faith-based?
The curriculum we run is BA Music. The good thing about music is its the same everywhere. But then we need to appreciate that Music generally came out of the church. Some genres of music come from some other faiths. So, we can’t separate religion from Music. When students graduate from our department some of them play in Orchestra and we find many of the orchestras within the Church system. Some work in studio. Many of our students are abroad doing their post graduate studies though we have also started PG in MTU. I can tell you that the MTU Music department is arguably the best in West Africa. It is made so we can retain our students and leverage what we have here to get students abroad. We now produce PhDs in the department.
