Long Read: Who is watching out for all the other Professor Akindeles

Akindele

Editor’s Note

At the request of the article’s author, we have chosen to keep the identity of all parties named in this article anonymous. We can however confirm that the University referenced in the article is a private University in South Western Nigeria. 


The tale of Professor Akindele from Obafemi Awolowo University was a thread that briefly  tangled its way through students’ ecosystem connecting women in a depressingly common way. Fifteen years ago, this Akindele’s sexual assault news would have rested just within the four walls of the university through word of mouth, and could have been easily shunned as gossip. But today, with connectivity of  mobile technology and convergence, victimized women can easily find a sympathetic audience and collect evidence to substantiate their claims of rape, assault and sexual harassment. With a total number of 91.6 million active Internet users in Nigeria women are opportune to tell their story and society owes it to the 193 million total populations to take valid action beyond sending an email or press release through the click of a button. Campaigns such as the Black Lives Matter and the March For Our Lives protests in America recorded such large levels of participation through the sensitization of users of social platforms online. Last year, multiple women who’d struggled to speak on film executive, Harvey Weinstein, finally shared harrowing accounts of his culture of sexual assault and harassment, just after he was caught on tape and exposed through several news outlets including The New York Times and CNN.

We all seem to have an Akindele story, each one a little different but with essentially the same nauseating pattern and theme.

The Akindele story I am about to tell is a little different, mostly because the part where Akindele’s actions richly came out in the open, spiralling into a scandal did not happen for this guy. Instead, this professor has been ceremoniously sent-off through a beautiful prosopography sent via electronic email with no mention of sexual predation. Weirdly, his resignation happened just about the same time news on Akindele broke out.

On February 5th, I sat in an office with a member of staff in school, having a conversation similar to that a mentee-mentor would have. Our chief conversation about my own general state of affairs had ended, and  just before I could, she steered the conversation towards an investigation she and her human resource team were currently executing.

Overall our conversation held for an hour or thereabout. I am just as paranoiac as the next girl living in this society so like myself the narrator, I will keep the name of this woman, this school and the supposed sexual predator anonymous.

The woman tried to recall a time when during one of our conversations, I had casually mentioned this professor and a student towards whom he had made sexual advances but now she couldn’t remember the girl’s name. So she asked that I tell her. Unthinking, my first reaction was hesitation.

“Why???” I said, perceiving something unwilling to out a gi and trying to protect the name of this victimized student.

 

Seeing my apprehension, she explained to me how it was not the first time she would hear of this professor’s indiscretions and that some other administrative and faculty members had heard the rumours as well. However, whenever she is asked about the professors malpractices, she never has any concrete evidence or statement to assert if this claim is true or not. She explained that the reason they are now inquiring into the case is because the staff have noticed students’ general aversion to  him. Thus, they would not like that kind of culture to amplify.

In spite of my first hesitation, I shared accounts of all the scenarios I could bring to mind:

  • Prof x tells his class to write poems as a take home assignment. A student writes a love poem with some sexual innuendos and he calls her to his office, asking her to read the poem while looking into his eyes

 

  • Prof x tells a female student, who was fond of submitting her assignment late and was turning in yet another overdue assignment, to dance for him in the way she would normally dance in the night clubs she often goes to
  • Prof x tells a student that he constantly sees her in his dreams; he collects her number and would call her sometimes. When she doesn’t pick or call, he would call her to his office, asking her why

 

  • Prof x often gave his lectures and engaged in conversations massaging his fingers, drawing attention to the extraordinary length of his fingers and thus making students to draw sexual allusions to the long fingers since some of them already knew of his sexual mischief with students

 

  • Prof x had a female course assistant, who was doing her PhD in his department. She would wear high stilettos with above the knee tight skirts to class. In a school where female students are constantly sent back for not conforming to dress standards or cautioned for walking in a seductive manner, she was never sent back. Prof x and his assistant drove to school together and left together on their lecture days, yet again making students to draw allusions beyond a cordial working relationship.

It is two months and a week since this conversation took place; News came in last week Monday 9th April through the bi-weekly newsletter sent to the whole school via email that the prof has resigned. No reason given whatsoever. But a good prosopography was written narrating his many contributions to the university, other universities in Nigeria, Africa and Asia.

The short paragraph concluded with the fact that he played “a critical role in the development and success of the school and will be missed by staff and students of the university for his inspiring leadership and contributions”. Finally, the school wishes to “thank him for the years of dedicated service, including many accomplishments and wish him the best of luck in his new endeavour”.

The truth is this email was very offensive and should not at all have been sent.

The system is manipulated to allow a known sexual predator leave our school with his reputation intact, and the possibility of him moving to another school to harass other student unaddressed. Whereas, if the professor had been publicly disgraced or at least the students had been informed of the true circumstances behind his resignation it would have greatly limited his chances to prey on other vulnerable girls. The culture of excellence that the school prides itself in and the years of lectures given to students on ethics, philosophy, honesty and objectivity has been wounded. We all think the school public deserves to know. In sending this email, the school proved that they were ‘aware’ of his amorous relations and ‘decided’ to keep it under wraps. In sending this email, it appears the school is complacent about the issue. It appears that the investigation they begun  two months ago, was only set out to suppress allegations that he had sexually harassed or assaulted numerous women.

On writing this, I asked my schoolmate as some sort of social experiment: “Do you know why he resigned?” He replied, “I heard he was involved in some messy stuff”. And that’s the most anyone would get to know about it. It is more honest to address the awkwardness than pretend that the narrative has been resolved.

This professor taught me twice and he was one of the stingiest lecturers when it came to grading assessments. He would say, “I don’t eat marks. If you deserve it, you’ll have it”. But Professor x didn’t need to ‘eat marks’,, when he could just erode our self-esteem instead. Professor x combined a keen eye for good academic work, inspiring both fear and gratitude.

I could talk about many instances in which I personally have felt demeaned or exploited in any environment, but I fear it would get very repetitive. Then again that’s part of the point. Stories like these have never been taken seriously. Women are bullied, cajoled, manipulated, and worse, and then punished to first keep silent.

A decent amount of think pieces have  been published on Professor Akindele by some of the 19 million active social media users in Nigeria. A particular twitter account called Naija Virals made a long thread showing pictures and audio recordings of Akindele leaked to the public by friends and acquaintances of the girl involved. Reading through the comment section, it was worrisome to see some people say the recorded phone-call between the Professor/Pastor, Richard Akindele and the female student was not enough evidence! Even worse, was when some asked if the picture of the girl could be uploaded too.

Needless to say, even as technology has reduced the major principles of what used to be good Journalism to ridiculousness (a counter-argument may be fought), it was good to see that her identity has been protected so far.

With the ongoing issue of sexual harassment by preying men, Jia Tolentino, a staff writer at New Yorker wrote late last year saying: “stay silent and you have acquiesced to whatever happened. Tell a friend and nothing much will be done. Come forward to an authority figure and you’ll face unfair consequences”. It is unfortunate, it is disgusting and it is proof that we live in such a dysfunctional society.

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