When President Bola Ahmed Tinubu swore in Prof. Tahir Mamman as Minister of Education on 21st October 2023, I congratulated the learned Prof. and wrote here that I first met Prof. Tahir in the University of Maiduguri in 1985 when he was employed as Asst. Lecturerer together with Prof. Maxwell Gidado at the Faculty of Law when I was a 300 level Law student at a time when duration to qualify for a Law degree in University of Maiduguri was four years minimum.
So Prof. as an Asst. Lecturer did not teach my class, but I knew that only the best were given opportunity to teach in a university as fresh graduates.
I recall both Prof. Tahir Mamman and Prof. Maxwell Gidado were 1984 Law graduates. But whereas Prof. Tahir graduated from ABU Zaria, Prof. Maxwell was the best graduating student of University of Maiduguri that year.
Being from the then Gongola state, my friends and I of the state’s origin were proud that two of our compatriots, young and bubbling with life, were Law lecturers at a time when most of our lecturers were foreigners and the others southerners. Young Prof. Gidado and Prof. Tahir actually inspired me to be a lecturer.
At that time making 2:1 in Law gives automatic employment as Asst. Lecturer. And I was invited by the faculty to be one after my graduation. However, fate took me to a have a stint in legal practice with Ola Akpalara & Co. in Lagos as youth corps member, and at Boss Musdapha & Associates before fate again pushed me to banking and finally into politics.
Both Prof. Tahir and Prof. Gidado were employed by the University of Maiduguri in 1985. They were sent to the University of Warwick in England where they did a Masters degree in 1987-88 and went on to obtain a Ph.D between 1988 and 1992 in the same university. They both returned to University of Maiduguri as young Ph.D holders.
Prof. Gidado left University of Maiduguri to be a lecturer in the Nigerian Law School, Lagos in 1999. Six months later, Vice President Atiku Abubakar took Prof. Maxwell to the villa in Abuja as his SA Legal and Constitutional Matters. Whether by accident or design, Prof. Tahir Mamman left Maiduguri and replaced Prof. Maxwell in the Nigerian Law School.
Maxwell became a professor in Nasarawa State University while Tahir became one at Baze University. They are both SANs. I am proud of them both and respect them for their knowledge of the law. They both are SANS.
As a politician, Prof. Tahir had uncessfully contested primary election to the office of Adamawa State Governor in 2014, attempted contesting for Senate in 2019, was Caretaker APC North East Zonal Vice Chairman, and served as chairman of the party’s Constitution Review Committee as well as member of the NDDC board.
Many have argued that the removal of Prof. Tahir as Minister of Education was unexpected. On the contrary, I knew that the non controversial academic, made some errors (as humans do) that made some people to call for his removal to which President Tinubu agreed with Mallam Nuhu Ribadu (who brought his classmate Prof. Tahir as minister) that the learned Professor should go.
The learned Professor actually knows the Law for which I respect him a lot as I said, but I was surprised that his removal resulted from breach of the constitution. This followed the appointments he made in June, 2024 of members of governing councils of federal tertiary institutions that was questioned by stakeholders for lacking in federal character, and for which the president outrightly rejected the list.
In the said appointments, it was alleged that many states such as Niger State got just a few slots, Oyo State got only one slot, but Adamawa State alone got thirty-two people. As president’s men got infuriated by this, they asked for Prof. Tahir’s head. That he didn’t survive it did not surprise me at all. Backed by Law or not, whether military or civilian, every president’s men and tribesmen close to him are powerful in government. In this clime they are called the ‘Cabal’.
President Tinubu’s men and tribesmen had section 14(3) and (4) as well as section 157(3) of the constitution on National Character in castigating Prof. Tahir. The sections were meant to prevent the dominance by any sectional group, be it ethnic, geographic or religious, in the country’s political governance. They argued that 32 people from Adamawa alone and some of them cannot qualify to serve on boards of university councils even in Afghanistan, was bad enough.
They argued also that whereas section 14(3) and (4) of the constitution is on appointment into other offices in federal services, section 147(3) mandates the president to appoint a minister from each state of the federation to reflect the federal character of Nigeria.
This, to me, is what removed my learned senior. Now that he has been removed, I wish him well as always. But being not only a Professor of Law but a university administrator as well, I believe he will still be sought after by this country.
You have done your best sir!
- Dasin is a former House of Representatives member from Adamawa State.
