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From Obinna Odogwu, Awka
Controversy trailed the sack of five senior staff of Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu University, Igbariam, in Anambra State, recently. Given the circumstances surrounding their dismissal, many people have linked their sack to the issues arising from the recent contest for the post of the varsity’s Vice-Chancellor.
Prof. Kate Omenugha, who eventually emerged at the end of the contest, at a media chat with select journalists in her office, explained that the dismissal of the staff had nothing to do with the contest. She also spoke on other issues of concern.
About five members of your senior staff were recently relieved of their appointments. Stories out there have linked their sack to the recent contest for the VC position. Can you throw more light on why they were sacked?
Five members of our staff were dismissed. One of them, a professor, was one of those that vied for the position of the Vice-Chancellor in July last year. They were in the whole nine people that were eventually, in quote, shortlisted. And there are things I won’t begin to say. What I have learned in life is never to come down to somebody’s level; to start packing sands with the person. I carry myself with pride. You can go and Google all of us and see who is who. And see how he could be the number one in the Vice-Chancellor position. For competing with a woman who has been acting for a year and eight months; competing with a woman who was commissioner for eight uninterrupted years; competing with a woman who has been Head of Mass Com for six good years in UNIZIK; who has been a director. Who has worked with a former Vice-President as the person in charge of South-East for Human Capital Development as consultant; who has consulted for UNICEF, USAID and all manner of people. So, I won’t bother. Just go and check. Who has over 870 Google citations and then compare it with somebody who has just a few. My only worry is that we need to put a searchlight on that and let the independent people to look at that sham that was done. And that’s where I’ll rest it.
In concrete terms, was the Professor relieved of his appointment primarily because he contested for the post of Vice-Chancellor as people say out there?
No. He was sacked because he is a lecturer; essentially, what makes one to be in this university is to teach. And not to be a VC. VC is by luck. If you are lucky; if you are qualified; if you go for the interview and all manner of things; if you have the muscles and everything; you can be a Vice-Chancellor. But it’s not part of your agreement in this university. Your agreement is to teach. When he didn’t teach his master’s course in Political Science, the students petitioned the HOD. And the HOD gave him a query and copied me. In that query, he insulted me, insulted the governor. I’m sure some of you are privy to that, by his answer. He said all manner of things; insulted the HOD. But he never addressed the issue of ‘why didn’t you teach and examine your students.’ The Registrar gave him a query following that one. He also responded to the Registrar and said, as far as he’s concerned, there is no Vice-Chancellor; so he can’t write to me. And therefore he wrote to the Registrar. Registrar gave it to me. He sent it to the Staff Disciplinary Committee. He was invited three good times. On one occasion, they used a courier to send the invite to his house. He ignored everybody. He never came. So what do you expect? The rules are clear. He was given the opportunity to come and defend himself. He failed to come. They sacked him. The Disciplinary Panel recommended his sack. They sent it to the Council for approval. And there, they approved. So, anybody who knows Kate Omenugha knows that she’s not vindictive. I hear that some of you were saying that if you come here today you will get arrested by anti-cult. And I was like you don’t know me. When I got this position, people who thought they were close to me were telling me, ‘oh this person, go and do this and that.’ Me? I’m not going to waste my time trying to set traps and stuff. I don’t have such time. My target is to come and do my own beat and go. People were saying if I were you I’d do this and that. But me, I have a Catholic conscience. Quote me. And I will never do anything deliberately to hurt someone. So, why would I do that? Other people are working with me. OBC Nwankwo also contested. And he’s now in charge of our Teaching and Learning Centre; which is like an arm of DVC Academic in charge of Teaching and Learning. The director, the one in Physics, Okpala is in charge of our Cultural Heritage. He contested for the post. And he’s there, coming to meetings. We are socialising. It’s not a do or die affair. So many of them who contested for the post, we have been working together. So, it can’t be. He just didn’t do his teaching. And he didn’t come to defend himself, deliberately. He cannot say that he didn’t get the letters. So, if that happens, the rules are clear. The person goes. Does that answer your question?
He claimed that according to the rules and regulations of the school, any student who failed to reach 75 per cent class attendance would not be qualified to sit for an exam. And when he was given the query, he pointed it out. Can you address that?
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He told you that the students did not attend classes. I don’t know whether you read his response. And at a point, he said that it was only one student that was coming. You should have examined that student. You should have taught that one student. I don’t know whether you understand what I’m saying. Secondly, if you are keeping attendance for students, then we’ll also keep attendance register for you. You know? What has he presented that shows that he was coming to class? If you saw what Professor OBC Nwankwo wrote, telling people about this 75 per cent attendance, which we told the parents when they came; that we are going to implement it seriously. But the rule is there. But the rule is clear. If you are giving students attendance, yours will also be kept. Did he show you evidence that he was in class? He wasn’t in class. And he knows it. So he cannot say the students did not attend classes when he wasn’t there. At some point, I think he said, ‘I saw no students to be taught’. The same students are there, taught by other lecturers. I don’t know; how were they taught? It’s only his class. The students were not doing one course alone now. They were doing other courses. So how did that happen? And it’s only him, the holy and mighty one, that suddenly knew that students did not attend classes. That’s not true. He was just trying to make a defence.
I’m concerned that I’m seeing more trees than classrooms. And I know that I’ve read in the newspapers that you don’t have classrooms. Will there be a time when these students will be studying under the trees because of lack of classrooms?
I don’t think you are seeing more trees than classrooms. What you are seeing is a deliberate attempt to institutionalise tree planting because of climate action initiatives. And we have a policy in this university now, you don’t cut down any trees. Don’t cut down any trees and if you have a need to cut down any tree, you have to get approval from the Vice-Chancellor. So, you know, that’s what I said. Going around, people will talk from any dimension. He has talked of his own. He’s seeing more trees. He’s not seeing the futuristic… For the first time we have DVC Administration and Environmental Sustainability. Let me tell you, when this campus came up, all the trees were cut down. All the trees. Remember that this place was an agric settlement. All the trees were cut down by the people I don’t know. What we are trying to do now is restoration of those trees. Have you not wondered that if you go somewhere like UNIZIK, you will see trees lined up and people walking under the shade? Have you seen what I’m talking about? Go towards Law Faculty and towards Mass Com, you’ll walk under the shade. Go to Abuja and see that. Go overseas and see that. That is the way things are done. But I am surprised you said you are seeing trees, because I can’t see any trees myself. If you are walking, you will be beaten by the sun. When I first came, all the roofs were being blown off by the wind; very heavy wind here. All the roofs were being blown off. So apart from our modest effort of using above 0.5 gauge to do our roofs and most of the things we do are on a very good and on a high gauge, apart from that, we deliberately decided to plant trees. If you go to our Uli campus, you will see trees lined up and when you walk there, the sun will not be on you. So I don’t think you saw more trees. They are deliberately being planted. And yes, I can assure you that we sit on several hectares of land here in the Igbariam campus.
This is a state-owned university. What level of support are you getting from the state government to run this university?
If you went round, you would have seen so many buildings springing up; so many of them that I inherited; like the Med Lab. We inherited that one uncompleted. The governor gave us about over N100 million and then we added our internally generated revenue to get that place in order. If you now go to the one we are doing, both lab and classroom. Very soon we are starting the one that will house the Theatre Arts. So no, you are not seeing trees only. But that doesn’t mean that we don’t have a need for classrooms. We certainly do have a need for classrooms. And that’s why we are calling on public-spirited individuals to come and make their donations. The government is doing its own bit. We are doing our own. There’s nowhere in the world where education is left in the hands of the government alone. Everywhere, it’s the endowment that runs a university. I was at the University of Michigan last year and they showed us the map, the graph of where they started with no endowments and where they’re now with millions and billions of dollars. It’s from people. Our people have not got that culture of doing endowments. People should have to learn to think about it. My husband will soon be 70 and we are celebrating it. We are trying to build a library for our primary school, giving them some chairs, making their toilets work. That’s our own endowment. That’s the culture that our people don’t have. Every time people say the government is not doing this or that. No! But yes, we need more classrooms here. TETFund is actually trying their best because we had to develop relationships and we equally go to them and sometimes they are the ones that will give us the money and we are doing some of those things we are doing. The government, like I told you, is doing 4.2 kilometres of a road in our university. It is not a small thing. The gate that they are doing at Uli campus is not a small thing. The N140 million given to us already to do our med lab is not a small thing. The Solution Wifi already put here is not a joke. They are doing their own bit. But we are calling on people to help us and see that we get more classrooms. The truth is that the population is growing and the people who are putting up this fence, this year alone, we have over 8,000 people who have put us as first choice. And that is something commendable.
You mentioned your plans for distance learning. Can you throw more light on that?
We are also thinking of setting up open and distance learning. And we are working to see whether we can have open and distance learning so that those who don’t get in can go to the open and distance learning and stuff like that. It is a little different. It’s challenging for Ndigbo. Ndigbo should know that. If you go to Yorubaland, they have so many universities there, and with all of us trying to study, there are very few universities in this state. We are the only state university here. So it is not very easy for us here. We don’t have enough classrooms, I agree. But we have quite a bit that we are trying to juggle about. I don’t know whether you went to the 2024 TETFund project. Did you enter there? That’s what we are going to use for open and distance learning. We started first of all by building that place so that anybody who needs a classroom can go there and any department can go there. They will still go there because for Open and Distance Learning, they only come periodically. So the classroom is still available for people who are there in sociology and they don’t have where to sit to go there and do their lecture. And that’s part of what we are trying to do. Facilities can be shared. Everything must not be I, me and myself.
Recently, the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) Owerri Zone said that five months after the commencement of the 2025 FGN-ASUU Agreement, that this university has not deemed it necessary to commence that implementation. Is it true?
That’s Aribodor. Quote me, he is just seeking relevance. The man is just seeking relevance. Ignore what he is saying. This university is going to celebrate 10 years of our uninterrupted academic calendar. If you know this country well, you will know; I mean, I’m from a federal university, UNIZIK. You will know that after they have made their position known, the federal government will decide on what to do. States will also go back and negotiate. Thank God that we now have a vibrant Pro-Chancellor who is leading the way. That’s all I can say. So, we are starting our negotiation.
