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MPs, universities need practical political concepts
2005-04-21 08:25:21
By Mwondoshah Mfanga
A very important Bill was for discussion in Parliament last week. What is known as the University Bill 2005 is aimed at making sure that universities in the country are established and run by charter.
But that is not the crux of the matter of the new Bill. The hair-raising issue is what some Parliamentarians want to exonerate members of the intelligentsia of a very important aspect of life and development—that is practicing politics in universities.
Reports from Dodoma say some MPs who debated the Bill, tabled by Science, Technology and Higher Education Minister, Dr Pius Ng’wandu, opposed it.
A number of legislators did not only say yes to the Bill, but went on to condemn the practice of politics in universities.
The reasons given by those who opposed it are that there is no way the academia can be sequestrated from politics and that there is a way in which the law can be used badly against the academicians.
Those who supported it, among other things, said the banning politics in universities was good because it would give the students and teachers more time to concentrate in academics and development issues.
“The nation needs development, and that will be achieved, only and only, if education is improved. How are we going to make it if we continue to allow political activities in universities?” Omar Mjaka (Vitongoji-CCM) asked.
The Bill once passed will enable the formation of a university commission that will be charged with formulating guidelines for establishment, governing, running and administration in universities, according to reports from Dodoma.
Under the tabled proposals, political activities in university premises will be banned, according to Dr Ng’wandu.
One really fails to understand what is meant and intended by banning political practice (or activities) in universities.
Without beating around the bush, there was a big mistake in the very proposal tabled by the minister, as it does not make a distinction between political practice and political activity.
The fact that the proposed Bill suggests that politics should be banned in universities shows clearly that the government is not interested in seeing members of the academia practicing politics, let alone do political activities.
This would look strange if the tabled Bill is passed because the government would be interfering with the freedom and right to education of the intelligentsia.
Besides the fact that one can hardly ban politics in universities, as correctly observed by Dr Amman Kabourou of Chadema, to deny the same in institutions of higher learning is to refuse the students and staff a key technique in the very studies and development that the MPs emphasise.
Political practice (not necessarily activities) is part of studies among political science students and professors in most developed countries’ universities. In some countries, some key concepts on change in politics, parties and governance are hatched or baked in universities.
That is why universities like Harvard, Stanford in the US and Oxford and London in the UK are centres of certain idea that have shaped or dominated the world for generations.
The intelligentsias, therefore, do practice politics, either amongst themselves, in groups, through their institutions or by offering consultancy to politicians, the very people who deny them of practicing politics in universities.
The irony of the Bill and the mixed up feelings about some MPs buying the idea of banning politics in universities are really inconceivable.
It reminds me of a case in which the Principal of Moshi Police College, Mwesiga, in 2003 chucked off a number of college students who were found not to have qualified to join the college after they had studied for months in the institute.
Among the things, which made them disqualify, were presenting fake certificates and providing wrong information about their health and previous schooling.
The College authorities then just chucked them out of the institution. That was all. Common logic would have compelled the principal to arrest the students and charge them in the court of law because the work of the police is to arrest criminals.
But besides this, the principal could have used the dismissed students as a case study for the rest of the students for class assignments in the course of arresting and charging the same in the court of law.
It is sad that this was not allowed to happen, but this would have been the right way of dealing with the chucked students because they were criminals.
Back to the bizarre remarks by the MPs on the banning of politics in universities, many of our universities are teaching politics and related subjects.
Can you imagine how dangerous it is to teach a student of politics the science and at the same time deny him or her to do practice— in the institution he is studying?
Law students are taught the language of the lawyers and begin observing the same right from universities, including organizing moot courts.
Medical students are taught how to dissect insects and the human body, and take fun in doing the same in the theatres, yet they do this on the life of individual human beings. Engineering students do their studies in workshops, while fine artists take fun in molding different shapes of things in arts workshops and the like.
It only becomes a problem when politics students (and perhaps when joined by fellow students) have to practice in their institutions of learning—and they are merely dealing with political institutions, not the real bodies of human beings like surgeons.
Why should the legislators and those who are in power fear this practice? The reason is clear—they do not want to keep those who know in a practice that the politicians would like to have monopoly on. In other words they are fending off unwanted encroachment from the intelligentsia, perhaps until when they want it.
For otherwise would there be a reason for physics, chemistry, and zoology or botany students to embark on laboratory experiments after their theory work? Would there be a reason for medical students to go to the theatres if it was not all because of practice?
Our MPs must have a new way of looking at this issue. Rather than deny universities taking part in politics, it would be ideal if they could be allowed, but the practice only confined to some limits.
Just as laboratories, theatres and workshops exist in universities to offer some limited practices of theoretical work, and they only operate within those socially agreed limits, it is high time that our MPs gave a new conception of political practice in universities.
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