Nigeria, Aug. 2 -- There's a quiet cruelty that festers behind the ivy-covered walls of Nigeria's public universities. A plague that rarely makes it into senate meetings or faculty memos. Unlike the crises of underfunding,strikes, and brain drain familiar refrains in any conversation about Nigerian academia this one is more insidious. It's workplace bullying and harassment. And it is as pervasive as it is ignored.

Across many countries, workplace harassment is increasingly met with institutional reckoning, comprehensive policies, whistleblower protections, disciplinary procedures. Even corporations in Nigeria have begun to implement clear anti-harassment codes. But in Nigeria's public universities, it's as if the memo never arrived. Hara...