During the post-performance discussions, members of the university community expressed joy over the manner in which the problems ravaging the academic institution, especially University of Port Harcourt were captured in the play, considering the short period the research team were with them. Some were even marvelled that people who acted with the students blended so well.
Commenting on the impact of the performance, Prof Victor Dappa, a senior member of ASUU and a professor in the department of Basic Medicine in the University of Port Harcourt asserted as follows:
Gbuji‖ performance was indeed revolutionary in nature, and as such it was a positive one. So I think more of this should be seen around our environment and our society at large, so that we can push for the positive change we desire. As an actor in the production, I can easily remember these few lines of mine ―How many leaders have the university produced in our country?‖ none. But in some developing countries the universities produce leaders that are true. So ―Gbuji‖ as a performance itself was a very interesting one and one that projects the struggles of ASUU and on the other hand, mediate between the warring parties in the university. Therefore, if the government of our nationtakes a sincere look at the
75 academic sector, these unnecessary strike actions will be a thing of the past, hence, the country will move forward. (30/10/2018)
The implication of Dappa‘s submission on the performance however is that the production was a huge success and it addressed the core of the ASUU struggle.Another senior professor who was also a member of the audience, Prof Nathaniel Abraham, Head of Educational Management, University of Port Harcourt commented as follows:
Whenever ASUU down strolls, there are many consequences. In the first place, they truncate the academic calendar. Somehow in the Nigerian university system, a student may know when he or she starts a programme but may not know when the programme will come to an end, because if there are strikes, some stretching for months, time is lost. Sometimes a whole session or close to a session is lost.
Children in private schools or those abroad will finish in record time and those in public universities most times overstay. That is one of the effects of ASUU strike.
To us as members of ASUU, whenever we go on strike, the government tries to starve us, they withdraw our salaries, there are some of us, both husband and wife like myself, are members of ASUU. So you will find a situation where there is no source of income for the family, no money coming in through the husband and the wife and the entire family suffers. It also exposes our students, when they are not profitably engaged in the school; some go about doing unwholesome things.
Chances are that some of them have been involved in accidents, and in things that probably should have been avoided if they were in school. So it has so many effects on the individual members, the entire society, the students and everyone.(30/10/2018)
From his submission therefore, it is imperative to note that productions such as this, can influence the University management and Governing Council and by extension, government to acting rightly and swiftly too. Based on Professor Abraham‘s observation, the success of this production was highly informing and commendable. However, it was argued that some foreign universities do not depend on government for funding, yet they hardly experience internal squabble as are recently experiencing in UniPort; rather, they have become more innovative in their dealings and fund raising. This prompted FlorenceOkosimiemaKalio, a politician, to admit thus:
76 Having watched the experiment on ASUU struggle, I got more informed about the plight of the lecturers, the internal squabble in UniPort and also I think it is important that government invest more on education and funding public universities. And I also think it is important that the university community become greatly innovative. Universities shouldfind ways to raise funds. In the play, they mentioned Harvard, Harvard do not necessarily get funds from the United State government. Harvard has become innovative and you see that they do not only get funds from the Alumni, they also have other programmes where they raise funds from the summer school, so I think the university should become innovative and look for other ways of raising funds rather than waiting for government. Also I think ASUU is selfish and they should become less selfish and also consider the plight of students. (30/10/2018)
Speaking further on the performance, when asked to comment on the realistic nature of adopting the model where the whole stakeholders congregated under one umbrella to articulate the problem of the Nigeria tertiary education, Dr (Mrs) Adedamola Olutoyin OshoOnyeaso of the department of Human Kinetics, a senior ASUU member and UNIPORT ASUU Investment Officer, commented that:
Emphatically, it was very realistic. The production told us what is going in the university society. What destroyed the world is lack of communication,that world was represented by ―The Tower of Babel‖ and this particular communication has the power to bring us together again in other to remove rebellion from ASUU, students or whatever because if a student has a wrong impression of why the lecturers strike. There is inadequate or completely lack of communication but clips like this will familiarize and orientate the minds of the parents, the students, the lecturers and everybody perfectly. This is an advocacy and it is one of the strongest weapons you can use to get the government to improve on the educational sector. So it has my 99%, if not maybe 100%perfect to me. The students and all the stakeholders today did very well.(30/10/2018)
It is worthy of note to state that from every indication, the performance was a huge success, because it addressed the subject of the discourse, driving the message clearly to all who watched the performance with keen interest and creating the understanding of ASUU struggle to all and sundry.
The resolution of the play took place in a formal meeting where the government officials, ably led by the president himself came to commission the new administrative building of the
77 university. The following personalities accompanied Mr. President: the minister of education, minister of labour and productivity, NUC Secretary, Vice Chancellor and his team, students and other critical stakeholders. Here ample opportunity was given to all the parties to present their cases before Mr. President, who saw things for himself for the first time. Mr. President listens to all the parties involved and he granted all their prayers and promised immediate execution of everything.