Ochonu’s piece was referring to the Plenary Speech I gave at the 20th Texas Africa Conference held in Austin, Texas, under the leadership of Professor Toyin Falola. I am not responding to his opinion, which he is entitled to, but to put matters in proper perspectives. He had asked a similar question to me, which he prefaced as his premise to his current jaundiced analysis and reference, as contained in this forwarded piece, to my tenure in the University of Abuja. I replied him when he tried to relate my submission as well as the reply to his observation about the politicians’ usual resort to and the usual retort about their infrastructural achievements. In my paper, I gave a detailed analysis of the state of infrastructural development of the University upon my appointment in 2004 June, that is, after the University had existed for 16 years in a setting meant for a primary school. One of my challenges as a visionary leader was not to leave for my successor such an eyesore, considering that the University was the premier tertiary institution in the Federal Capital. I was able to move it out of the eyesore setting to the Permanent Site by May 5th, 2009 – just three weeks from the end of my tenure. Ochonu should come and see the difference between the Permanent Site (PS) that boasted of, among other infrastructures, the first phase of the Senate Building; a network of roads of not less than 14 kilometres; functional reticulated water service (with the assistance of Nassir el-Rufai, as the Hon. Minister of the Federal Capital Territory then); Faculty Buildings housing Faculties of Art; Agriculture; Engineering; Veterinary Medicine; and Management. I also put in place a printing press at the PS for the promotion of academic purposes. I embarked on the building of the University Library, which today stands a testimonial to my vision of having an edifice to the promotion also of scholarship on the Campus. It is one of the biggest in the country, too. If a scholar of the calibre of Ochonu would not consider all these as conducive to scholarly pursuit, he should tell us whether universities in the US where he is based, in their developmental strides, neglected infrastructures to promote only the publication of articles in impactful journals. If their pattern of development followed this trajectory that combined both promotion of infrastructural development and the introduction of academic programmes (see below), then, he has turned logic upside down on how young universities have developed in history. Seriously speaking, is Ochonu saying that the universities in the US did not combine the development of infrastructure with academic programmes SIMULTANEOUSLY? He should, furthermore, tell us whether or not he shares an office with another professor in the university where he is teaching. Among the wisdom in infrastructural development was my foresight that when academics shared offices, there would be a natural negative impact on scholarship and even space for contacts with students for their intellectual development as well. Indeed, when I went to the Wake Forest University as a Fulbright Scholar in the USA in the 2010/2011 academic session, I was given a room for my use alone; I didn’t share with any professor despite the fact that I was just there for a session, a short period at that. The University also thought it wise to give me accommodation on the Campus for the one-year sojourn. He should tell the world what would have been my feeling if, on my arrival for the program of teaching and research, I was asked to go and squat in a students’ hostel. Wouldn’t such treatment resonate as discrimination because I was a black Fulbright Scholar? On the issue of paying much attention to academic and scholarly activities, I informed my audience that I set up the following NEW PROGRAMMES in my five-year tenure: Medicine; Veterinary Medicine; Agriculture; and Engineering. He deliberately refused to acknowledge these programmes that have, one way or the other, added to the academic tone in the Campus. These most important programmes were introduced to redress the ratios government has assigned to Science (60%) Arts (40%) in the case of “Conventional Universities) in both admission and and academic programmes of all federally-owned universities. The University of Abuja is a conventional university whose ratios were 28% (Science) and 82% (Arts) on my arrival. Although when I was leaving in 2009, the ratio marginally was redressed to 40% for Science and 60% for Arts, the University was already set on a trajectory that was on its way to meeting Government stipulations.