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From Daniel Ezindu, Enugu
A public affairs analyst and public communications strategist, Hon. Chukwunonye Okereke, shares his thoughts on the alleged tampering of the academic records of the former Minister of Science, Technology and Innovation, Chief Uche Nnaji by the authorities of the University of Nigeria Nsukka (UNN). He harps on the need for the creation of an independent agency to warehouse results and transcripts of alumni of higher institutions in Nigeria and calls on the National Universities Commission to step in to salvage the system.
What’s your take on the issue involving immediate past Minister of Science, Technology and Innovation, Chief Uche Nnaji and his Alma Mata, UNN that led to his resignation?
Something strange actually happened in the UNN where the Vice Chancelor Professor Simon Ortuanya released the academic records of the then minister, Uche Nnaji who is an alumnus of the institution. The VC does not have power to release an alumnus’ academic records, it’s the Registrar who is like an accounting officer in the university. The Registrar is like the permanent secretary in a ministry. The VC is the chief supervisor. In this case, the deputy vice chancellor (Academics) who was in the system before Ortuanya didn’t release the results. It was the VC himself, who came to the university and met the DVC (Academics) on ground who understands the process. The VC did not liaise with any of them, but in his wisdom, he overshadowed everybody and quickly responded within 48 hours on a weekend. What kind of magic is that? So, it’s a huge challenge and I believe Nigerians are watching. And this is why we are revisiting this issue, because it’s not going to be swept under the carpet and it’s not going to die down. We are pointing fingers to the UNN, to the former acting VC (Prof. Ujam), to Prof. Simon Ortuanya. The action was political. They just want to stop Uche Nnaji because he’s gathering momentum as a prospective gubernatorial candidate in Enugu State, who resuscitated the lifeless All Progressives Congress in the state and became the bride of the people. But what they don’t know is that you can’t stop anybody whom God has destined to be anything in life.
Are you worried that alumni of higher institutions of learning may begin to find it difficult accessing their transcripts in the future in Nigeria?
Ordinarily, a transcript is supposed to be the property of a student or a graduate of a higher institution of learning. By the reason of being a graduate you have a shared relationship with that institution and your commitment is tied to that school because that was where your destiny was given direction, and that is why you take pride in the school you graduated from. You have access to everything and anything there and that’s why it’s always a thing of pride when an alumnus becomes a vice chancellor because they say he knows the challenges of this institution. Your transcript is your private property — you paid your school fees and you paid your departmental levies and before you are given your certificates of any form, you must have done what they call clearance. Clearance is to make sure you are fit in finance — whether you are owing the school or not. If you are owing, they will not issue your certificate or transcript to you. There’s a prescribed fee for your transcript to be issued to you and once the fee is paid, your transcript should be given to you. Why has it not become a legal tussle in UNN if something fishy is not playing out there? Do you need a court order to release the transcript of a student or a former student to him? You don’t need it. What you need is a financial commitment from the student or the alumnus; and once that’s done, it becomes obligatory on the institution to release the transcript to alumnus or the organisation that requires it for whatever reason it’s needed. And the reasons are not far-fetched — to ensure that certain critical courses were passed by the alumnus. So, it’s your property and you have every right to request for it and get it. You don’t need an order from the court as is playing out presently.
So, has the former minister approached the UNN for the release of his transcript and that request was turned down?
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Yes. He has applied to the university authority to release his transcript. He has paid for it, but it hasn’t been issued to him. It’s part of the prayers he made to the court. What the former minister, Nnaji is doing is to preserve his integrity, his reputation that they are trying to erode. Whereas the school he graduated from has as its Motto, ‘To restore the dignity of man,’ but they are eroding the dignity of an alumnus by reason of their tampering with his academic records, which is a criminal offence. This is why some of us are advocating, in Nigeria, for a third-party agency to warehouse an alumnus result of universities, polytechnics and colleges of education so that such dynamics will not crop up tomorrow — if you don’t like the face of an alumnus, you start tampering with his academic records. There should be a third-party agency where you will apply and they will give you this information. If there were to be a third party agency, there wouldn’t have been any issue with the UNN. This has led us to advocate for the establishment of an agency that would be responsible for the verification and issuance of results and transcripts of alumnus of polytechnics and universities.
Are you saying that VC ought not to respond to correspondences concerning students or alumni results and academic records?
The vice chancellor responds to certain correspondences; but he does not have the power to respond to correspondences that have to do with examinations, results and academic records. It’s not his responsibility. If such a request comes unto his table, he minutes it out to the registrar — it’s the registry that’s vast and knows the results that you have passed, it knows the courses you have carryover and it knows the credit loads of every course. The VC does not have such information, the people who do are those in the registry department — this is because every staff in that department provides both expert and instant information to the registrar. She is the one that makes such results available to the Senate and defends them at that level. It’s the Senate that determines and decides that XYZ have stayed more than three or four years in this school and so, let us graduate them. You don’t question it. It’s the Senate that determines that this student has two points to First Class, let’s award it. They set the academic rules of the university –the VC only has one vote and he may play politics there if he wants. He does not have that capacity to lord it over them.
Simply put, you are worried that the VC released the academic records of the ex-minister just two days after receiving a letter to that effect without the input of the registrar?
Yes. We are all worried — myself and other Nigerians are worried, and this is why I have maintained that the move was politically engineered and the VC was merely serving the interest of his masters. Some people facilitated his ascension as VC even when there were too many protests starting from his being qualified, number of articles he supposed to have written as professor and even in the list of professors of universities in Nigeria that his name was not in NUC and a lot of other things around him. But you know university environment has become a political platform and the purveyors of the game that facilitated his ascension were there with enough cash and it was more or less a politically-motivated arrangement. This was why he quickly dropped his thinking cap at home and hurriedly executed their hatchet man’s job. Why? Time was of essence to them and so, they acted very fast. But fortunately, or unfortunately, the court will reverse it, they are just buying time. Uche Nnaji’s resignation was to step aside as a man of integrity for the proper thing to be done. He didn’t want to allow unscrupulous elements to use the scenario to cajole the administration of President Bola Tinubu, who happens to have so much confidence in him. This is why he’s going the whole hog of this process to ensure that the right thing is done. But most of them would not want to resign, because there are skeletons in their cupboard — they can’t do what he has done. He didn’t step aside because of guilt; he stepped aside to teach Nigerians that your life does not hang in any political position and the most important thing for you is your integrity. And that’s what he’s fighting. He has a clean bill of health — it’s not as if he’s asking the court to pardon him, he wants the university to release his transcript. It’s as simple as that. The moment this is done and Nigerians get to see it, we will be grateful for the system. Why are they reluctant at releasing the transcript? It’s because the UNN, the VC and others who participated in this tampering of the former minister, Nnaji’s records, will be tried for a criminal offence. They just perpetrated illegality.
Some are of the view that this development could hamper the relationship between the ex-minister and President Tinubu, who is seeking re-election in 2027. Do you share in this view?
People just don’t understand who Uche Nnaji is. He has been around for over 25 years — he ran for Senate in 1999 at the dawn of this democracy and won. He has sponsored a lot of political players and his relationship with President Tinubu is personal. His support for APC is forever. His relationship with Tinubu is more than cordial and he’s hell-bent in making sure the president’s re-election bid is actualised come 2027. For now, let’s leave it at that.
