At inaugural lecture, Prof Adeniyi calls for stronger digital governance amid technological shifts in migration

Mr Adeniyi explained that digital technologies have transformed migration by enabling migrants to remain actively engaged with their home countries through social media platforms and other online channels.

The Vice-Chancellor of Baze University, Abiodun Adeniyi, has called for stronger governance of digital spaces and the development of ethical frameworks to address challenges posed by artificial intelligence and emerging communication technologies.

Speaking at the university’s seventh inaugural lecture in Abuja on Tuesday, Mr Adeniyi, a professor of communication and media epistemology, said governments, policymakers and other stakeholders must recognise the digital sphere as a critical dimension of modern life that deserves greater attention and protection.

He made the call while delivering a lecture titled, “How Your Village Is Following You: Mobility, Memory and the Mediated Persistence of Belonging.”

Among dignitaries at the event were the Obaro of Kabba, Solomon Owoniyi; former Imo State Governor Emeka Ihedioha; Managing Director of the Federal Medical Centre, Jabi, Saad Ahmed; Director-General of the Voice of Nigeria, Jibrin Baba-Ndace; and the Editor-in-Chief of Premium Times, Musikilu Mojeed.

Others included former presidential spokesperson Garba Shehu, founder of Agora Policy and former Executive Secretary of the Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (NEITI), Waziri Adio, and other prominent academics, policymakers and media professionals.

The lecture

Using the village as a metaphor for origin and identity, the communication scholar said advances in communication technology meant that people could remain connected to their origins even after migrating from their communities of origin.

Mr Adeniyi explained that digital technologies have transformed migration by enabling migrants to remain actively engaged with their home countries through social media platforms and other online channels.

“The idea of the village here is not the village that we ordinarily see. I’m using the village as an anecdote for origin, the beginning point, with imagination,” he said.

“The village follows us through the digital space and through ordinary things that we carry about, through our telephone, WhatsApp, social media, diaspora networks, digital memory, and all of that.”

He said these technologies allow people to maintain identities rooted in memory and culture even while physically distant from their homelands, describing it as the end of ‘departure’.

According to him, migrants leave behind digital footprints that sustain connections to their communities of origin, creating what he described as “new geographies of belonging.”

“Times have changed. Wherever we go, we leave digital footprints, we leave real traces. There are new geographies of belonging, and of course, these geographies also help us to move with our villages,” he said.

“We are not carrying the village along, we are not carrying the points of departure along, but it is moving with us at the level of memory, at the level of identity, at the level of belonging.”

Calls for regulation

Mr Adeniyi explained that as more aspects of human interaction move online, efforts to secure digital environments should receive the same level of attention as physical security.

He urged authorities to make a “conscientious effort” toward improving security and governance in digital spaces through regulation and ethical safeguards.

According to him, technological advancements have made digital platforms central to how people maintain relationships, construct identities and sustain ties with their communities of origin.

“We may not need to be holding these telephones anymore. Maybe some kinds of things will be injected into us, and through that, we’ll be able to communicate,” he said.

“We are in a world of surveillance. It can be very difficult to hide in a digital space…And if we know that the digital space is critical to our existence, what is the governance context of that space? Is the digital space being addressed properly? Are we not paying lip service to it? Do we not think that there should be a conscientious effort towards growing the security within that space?”

Chancellor speaks

In his welcome address, the Chancellor of Baze University, Yusuf Datti Baba-Ahmed, said universities exist to ask difficult questions and provide answers that deepen society’s understanding of itself.

He described the inaugural lecture as a reflection of Mr Adeniyi’s intellectual journey and contributions to knowledge.

Mr Baba-Ahmed said the lecture addressed some of the most pressing questions of the modern era, particularly how people maintain connections with their origins in an increasingly mobile and interconnected world.

“It is through occasions such as this that noble responsibilities become visible and tangible,” he said.

About the lecturer

Mr Adeniyi’s career spans journalism, academia, consultancy and public engagement.

He obtained his bachelor’s degree from Ahmadu Bello University and earned a master’s degree in International Communications from the University of Leeds in England through the Chevening Scholarship. He later obtained a doctorate from the same university, where he also served as a teaching assistant at the Institute of Communication Studies.

He previously worked as a communications consultant for the World Bank-supported Economic Reform and Governance Project at the Bureau of Public Procurement in Abuja.

Mr Adeniyi joined Baze University as a senior lecturer in Mass Communication and served as head of department from 2016 to 2023. He became an associate professor in 2018 and attained the rank of professor in 2021.

He is also a visiting professor at Kogi State University, Anyigba, and the University of Abuja.