THE UNFAIR JUDGEMENT

Whenever I hear/see Africans accuse African scientists of not inventing anything or creating anything novel in Science, I laugh so hard, I fall off my chair.

I used to get really pissed off at the level of ignorance expressed by such persons but I later realised they may be unaware of the underlying issues surrounding this topic which is why they think the way they do. A little explanation coming from an African Scientist might perhaps help reduce their ignorance.

In this 21st Century, studying any area of STEM requires huge funding and state-of-the-art facilities. Without funding and facilities, novel ideas in the heads of our Professors and Researchers in Africa will starve to death! You can't keep blaming African academics for not inventing anything, when they are not provided with the funding and facilities that naturally stimulates creativity. Doing so will be most unfair!

Let's take myself as an example. As an academic at the Federal University of Technology, Akure (FUTA) in 2014, I supervised the project of an undergraduate final year student who worked on the effect of acid rain on maize. Rain is normally slightly acidic (pH < 7) but rain with the pH of 5.6 and below is tagged, “acidic”. My student’s project revealed that maize can resist acid rain from a pH of 5.6 up to the pH of 4.0 before experiencing necrosis, chlorosis, cob size reduction, blackened ears and so on – physiological responses to stress. The implication of this is that, as greenhouse gases are released into the atmosphere, there may be a proportional increase in the acidity of rain. Maize will however, be one of the few food crops that can still be cultivated successfully under such conditions.

She got a Distinction mark in her project as expected and then I made effort to publish the work in a reputable peer-reviewed international Journal on environmental toxicity. The paper was rejected and the reason was stated clearly: “Dear Authors, it is not enough to study the resistance of maize to acid rain. It is equally important to reveal the “mechanistic process” associated with the resistance at pH 4.0 and above as well as its susceptibility at any pH below 4.0.”

This meant I needed to study the physiological stress of the maize as well, e.g. how acid rain affects chlorophyll content, photosynthetic process, production of some phytochemicals, inhibition of the expression of some genes responsible for fruiting, etc. These will require studies at the molecular level and they are not cheap!!! Also, where are the facilities to study all these? You see that it is easy to blame African academics when it is not that they are lazy thinkers but the truth is most of them are helpless!

In 2015, I was fortunate to get a scholarship to pursue a PhD degree at the University of Manchester, UK. On getting there, I was inspired to design a novel technique to help carry out in-situ (groundwater) arsenic mobilisation studies. After 4 months of critical thinking and back-and-forth discussions with my supervisors, I finally designed a novel deployment vessel on paper.

However, I am a scientist and not a craftsman so I needed someone to make it for me. Here is where I fault the two Nigerian entrepreneurs Zainab Haruna talked about sometime ago – who claimed that First-class graduates in Nigeria can only become lecturers but cannot work successfully in industries, as if it is a bad thing.

Apart from the fact that such a statement was loosely made and indicates a clear case of hasty generalisation, it appears such ignorant entrepreneurs cannot differentiate between the role of a university from that of an industry. It is true that for any society to advance, 80% of her best brains must be retained in academic institutions.

This is because only in such a learning atmosphere can creative ideas be born, nurtured and funded. Most of the great scientists we know (Albert Einstein, Nicola Tesla, Ernest Rutherford, James Chadwick, Isaac Newton, Alan Turing, Marie Curie, Galileo Galilei, Michael Faraday, Thomas Edison, etc.) discovered their theories and principles in the university – Yes I repeat, within the four walls of a university. This is because, the sole purpose of the university is to birth new knowledge/creative ideas/products which are then mass-produced by industries/large factories.

So in truth, the university actually need highly intellectual minds (who think things) while industries need craftsmen (who make things). This is why I cherish the decision of FUTA to retain their First-class graduates. Even here at the University of Manchester, First-class graduates are offered direct PhD positions.

Therefore, as a scientist I needed a craftsman to bring my novel design to life so I went to the Workshop in the University. I met with a craftsman named Barry Gale who had an experience of over 20 years making stuff. As I explained what I wanted to do, he provided me with the vital details of the type of screws to buy, the grade of plastic, the category of steel rod that won’t rust if sunk in a borehole after 2 years, and many other info that a good craftsman should know. After 2 months, the vessels (4 of them) were finally made and they looked beautiful. They cost me ￡1000 (i.e. about N500,000). Just imagine the cost! And I have not even started the experiment itself.

During the testing of the vessel, I used various techniques to verify arsenic mobility and mineralogical changes e.g. XRD, XPS, ICP-AES, ICP-MS, Py-GCMS, XRF, TEM, ESEM (Find picture attached), FTIR and even considered XAS (Synchrotron facility). The cheapest of these machines is the FTIR which costs about ￡100,000. In the end, the vessel worked and will now be tested in the field at an arsenic-rich aquifer in Cambodia – a project funded by the UK government up to about ￡600,000!

What did you think made it possible for me to be able to successfully design the vessel? Funding and facilities, of course! Both of which are hardly available in Africa. Don’t forget I am still the same African scientist who struggled with the acid rain project while in Nigeria. The only thing that changed is that I moved to a place where funding and facilities are available and my creative potential came to life.

Science in the 21st century studies items and processes to the molecular level...in fact, to nanoscale and this is damn expensive!!!

Until funding and facilities are provided for the African scientists in Africa, it will be grossly unfair for anyone to suggest that they are all lazy and lack the ability to think creatively and innovatively. In fact, we can bring Wakanda to life if everything is provided. ????????????

I submit.

~ Macaulay Babajide Milton