Dear Editor,

What could possible go wrong, again, at Charles Darwin University?

It is good to see Professor Bo Bo [Scott Bowman], as he is affectionately known by some, taking the university back to the future with his latest amazing, mind-numbing plans to provide CDU courses to students in the United Kingdom.

While some previous attempts have attracted criticism, surely this one makes eminent sense.

Just because existing programs aren’t working, such as the attempt to unnecessarily duplicate very successful programs, like the joint medical program with Flinders University.

Or, the decision to enter into agreements with government bodies to build a large, new, expensive city campus to duplicate an already excellent, existing campus at Casuarina, without adequate risk planning on prospective new student enrolments.

Despite this, it is important to continue to think outside the square – and under Bo Bo’s leadership, the more outside, the better.

What does it matter that Darwin is closer to the huge, prosperous and growing markets of Asia than it is to southern city capitals, and that successive governments in both Australia and the Territory have seen Darwin as the gateway to Asia?

Doesn’t it make good sense to think differently to others and to re-orient our view away from the Pacific and back to where we used to be – close to the home country?

After all, as people would realise, everyone including the United States of America and China, think this way.

No! Bo Bo knows the mother country, because that’s where he came from.

They are bound to recognise and appreciate someone who has made it good in the colonies.

It is said of Breaker Morant, an Australian hero to many for example, that he always regarded himself as an Englishman. Rather, he was someone who had come to visit the colonies.

On top of this, Bo Bo now understands the culture of the old colony and Darwin in particular, like the back of his hand.

It is a place where you can spend inordinate amounts of hard earned tax-payer’s money, because politicians don’t give a hoot or understand what you are doing. Besides, Bo Bo quickly learned to get into the swing of things by hiring family members or close friends to positions under one’s influence.

As a matter of fact, he gets it on both sides of the Atlantic in a way few people can.

Bo Bo will probably invite the lord mayor as an important guest to his face-to-face masters program in business to recount our successful partnership in building the CDU city campus together.

He may also want to discuss his experiences in property development, with regard to the proposed new high rise hybrid civic centre-private office space building in one of Darwin’s most significant historical precincts.

Let’s just hope it is as beautiful as the new city CDU campus building.

What could possibly go wrong – again?

Don Fuller, Adelaide

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