*The battle for the soul of Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu University (COOU), where the voracious shepherd VC is eating the flock, as the emperor governor looks on….*
By the fall of 2017, a new Vice-Chancellor arrived Igbariam, the campus town that holds the future promise of a university formerly known as Anambra State University. A gust of hope followed his wake, the new man himself a gadget of an awakening change. His appointment, like in all dark systems resisting new dawn, received the flak of unhappy overlords. Soon, however, Professor Nwakoby—the new VC from neighbouring Nnamdi Azikiwe University—settled in, leading a series of reforms that brought emerging light to a school otherwise known to be trekking into a moral abyss.
From cleaning up some mess from the nasty administration he inherited to banishing the previously warring union faction and promoting neglected academics caught in the corporate line-of-fire, it seemed Nwakoby, a Professor of Law, it appeared was out to bind old ties and soothe festering wounds. More to his credit and while still in an acting capacity, he maintained a consistent track record of prompt salary payment, and strived to attract external stakeholders to commit towards the infrastructural development of the school. The university that has been serially abandoned by past and present state governments began to witness gradual makeover. Furthermore, he sustained a stable academic calendar, therefore, establishing the hope that a new dawn has indeed arisen.
But the hiccups that attended Nwakoby's inception were not little and it took the weight of the Academic Staff of Universities Union (COOU chapter) to assist the then embattled acting vice-chancellor to overcome the challenge mounted on his appointment. The resistance applied to his coming derived much substance from the fact the new Vice-Chancellor came from Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka—a federal public institution where he previously served as the Deputy Vice-Chancellor. Later did the ASUU-COOU come to realize that they were dealing with a wolf in sheep clothing.
To a great number, Nwakoby's appointment was bizarre, having defied the usual bureaucracy, tapping a candidate outside of the pool of expected contestants. Not very little found the appointment as an affront and an imposition by the State Governor, Willie Obiano. But backed by ASUU—whose central argument was that academic appointments, regardless of whatever pool it was drawn, is made substantial and meritorious by the strength of the appointee's portfolio and qualification, not political sentiments—Nwakoby eased into his prime seat, firing right away to work. This came at a personal cost to the immediate past ASUU-COOU branch chairperson Comr Emeka Nwabunnia, who was suspended by the national body of ASUU who participated in a committee meeting during the 2018 ASUU strike, for the sake of the smooth confirmation of Prof. Nwakoby as the substantive Vice-Chancellor (this is open for verification).
However, the real nature of the tyrant Prof. Nwakoby was completely unmasked on Thursday 24th September 2020, when lecturers loyal to the striking national ASUU gathered in the lecture hall of the Political Science Department in Igbariam's campus when it happened – a venue for the union's meetings since 2006! The convention aimed to deliberate on a bourgeoning rift consuming the school, with visitors comprised of branch chairpersons from ASUU Owerri zone, the zonal coordinator, and his predecessor. A crisis so prominent and grand it has, by then, attracted the attention of national media—covered by Channels TV, AIT, NTA, and a host of newspapers with national coverage. Professor Nwakoby, the jurist whom the potency and validity of his appointment were defended by ASUU is now at loggerheads with ASUU.
To stamp his authority, and display the finality of his stand, Prof Nwakoby sent armed men (the Anti-Cult force of the university) to disband the gathering and evacuate the academics—spanning from graduate assistants to professors—from not just the lecture hall but the school's premise. The scene that ensued was reprehensible, stomach-churning, and gut-wrenching. Sent out of the hall, the academics later convened under a mango tree in the open air, still faced with the harassment of the Anti-Cult force. This time, they stood their ground, singing solidarity and punching the air, held their meeting, and recorded the ignominy on parade. However, standing under a Mango tree for such an important convention, aptly painted an image symbolic of the very activist struggle advanced by ASUU and pledged to by these ambushed lecturers.
Before the Covid-19 pandemic shut down systems, closing schools and businesses, Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu University (formerly Anambra State University), the melting pot of this burning crisis, was a hub of industrious academic activities. These activities, characterized by state government neglect, severe infrastructural decay, and choking understaffing situation, featured students standing and/or seating under trees—mango, cashew, almond—to take lectures, acutely inadequate hostel facilities, poor library situation, deplorable toilets among others. And that, exactly, was at the core of ASUU-COOU's activism (this is also verifiable especially from the students).
The decay stretches, going beyond physical amenities. Standing under the illustrious mango tree and witnessed by the elements and onlookers, these persecuted lecturers recited how the tribulation and hellish state their service to knowledge has been. Although hard to grade the level of the mentioned evils, one specifically stands out, especially against the backdrop of the pestilential economic reality of the country. "For 11 years, since 2009—is that not 11 years?—our salary structure has not been reviewed", a man in a white and brown stripe long-sleeved shirt said, his speech produced with vehement eloquence. In addition to the mention of non-payment of arrears and earned academic allowances by the VC and the state government, the man further complained thus, "Look at us, there is no health insurance in COOU, and there is no pension after this job in this school; some of us when they remember they will retire, they develop strange illness".
The man continued, listing the fodder of their agitation, one after the other. Even as yet another speaker took the imaginary stage, a circular patch of red soil formed at the center of the lecturers, the complaints were similar. "Look around you, what shows that this place is a university? Even the few structures you see standing out were not built by the state government rather by the intervening and development schemes lobbied and brought to us by ASUU, but now they say we should not stand in solidarity with ASUU?". Recall that the almost 6 months old strike was embarked on to draw the commitment of the government to proper funding of universities, revitalisation of decayed infrastructure and erection of standard ones, unchecked proliferation of sub-standard private universities, the constitution of visitation panels for NEEDS assessment, improvement of staff welfare and fulfillment of a host of agreements reached with the government and the controversial introduction of IPPIS by the government. Hence for Prof Nwakoby to state that "ASUU is on strike because of IPPIS which does not concern his university", is just dishonesty and a blatant lie
The genesis of the new crisis in COOU however lies in the middle of the lockdown caused by the coronavirus pandemic. Professor Nwakobi, the school's Vice-Chancellor, compelled the school lecturers to begin digital learning, teaching the students through online platforms ranging from WhatsApp groups to unspecified video conferencing outlets. But that was a directive directly contradictory to ASUU's stand as they were already on strike, telling the Federal Government that Nigerian public schools are not properly equipped for such digital exertion.
Nevertheless, Nwakoby remained adamant, presenting a front that appealed to pubic emotion. At the surface, he seems to appear as the Vice-Chancellor who wants the unbridled intellectual good of his students, who is keenly devoted to the pursuit of knowledge. But that public posture, when subjected to thorough appraisal, crumbles before logic. For a school reported to pass NUC's federal accreditation examinations through underhanded means, the folly is apparent, and the falsehood, stinking. For a school that rents lecturers and books to stack up their departments and libraries, shooing over 70% of students away from school, just to look as if they satisfied the NUC's student quota criteria, where then, is the wisdom in that eagerness to resume schooling activity under these and several other backward and pretentious conditions? As eloquent as he may seem, pose these issues before him and watch him stutter (again, feel free to investigate broadly and verify from the students).
When the lecturers did not resume online teaching, clearly because they cannot go against the National strike, and because they lacked the technical infrastructures, the VC got even more charged and insistent. He then called for the physical resumption of some students (especially 100 level) who had outstanding examinations to write before the lockdown. A seemingly noble pursuit, ASUU, and her members let that pass in the interest of the students and to soothe the emerging strain on the relationship with the Vice-Chancellor. Again, with intimidation and aggression, the university management forcefully hijacked the 2020 staff appraisal exercises from department and faculty appraisal committees and unilaterally constituted kangaroo appraisal committees to hold the same, which the exclusion of those in favour of the strike. Soon, with the exams and appraisals over, the VC further called for the physical resumption of lectures for students in the graduating class, again, against ASUU's activism. The lectures are scheduled to last for ONLY 6 weeks (against the NUC minimum requirement of 14 weeks) and exams to hold in November. This violation of conventional standards and the sacrifice of quantity over quality did not go down well with the union, promising to notify NUC of the illegality. And, that is why COOU boils at the moment, the matter serving enough fodder for the journalism of the country's print and broadcast media—both traditional and digital (this is also open for verification).
On the part of Nwakoby, a law professor has turned a law offender, metamorphosing into a professional tyrant. More than sending armed men unto a convening academics, the professor has turned the school environment, offline and online, into a huge physical and virtual 1984, with thought police unleashed, and academic positions wielded as potent weapon—a cutlass of a sort—for cutting the staff into line and support, or out of the way and into the enemy camp. For a man who, on national television, personalized school amenities, saying "I cannot be paying you with my money...not with my classroom….", and countless times referring to a public university as "my university", we find a narcissist, a man with a disorderly personality complex, a man who can go any low to make and prove his point. He rarely consults, seeks opinion, or accepts counsel; the university senate meetings have become a gathering where he dishes out decrees to his subjects and professors and other senate members shiver in dumbness because to speak would amount to an invitation of shouts and harsh rebuffs (this is also open for authentication).
In all social media groups affiliated with the school, the VC (like Big Brother in the popular reality show) has planted an all-seeing eye and all-powerful hands, empowering them to kick out any lecturer or student who writes or shares an opinion or article that speaks against the VC and the pocketed school management. The university PRO, few coerced students, and class course reps as well as petty rent-seeking lecturers, it has been gathered, serves as the eyes and hands of the Nazi Vice-Chancellor. They spread the falsehood that it is a national strike that does not concern state universities, but COOU like other state universities benefit from the funding and infrastructure interventions. They claim COOU is 'peculiar' and should shun ASUU struggles, but the propagators of this fake message have not shown the gains from this 'peculiarity' to the university so far. Any course rep that refuses cooperation is uprooted and bludgeoned out of the way. The same university management, through the errand boy PRO (an associate professor), released a circular denying disrupting the Union's meeting with armed men when video evidence is in circulation (feel free to confirm these facts).
Armed with the arbitrary right to appoint or dismiss Head of Departments, the Vice-Chancellor recently removed some HODs who refused to play ball and has begun the plot to serially dismiss all HOD's (especially who are pro-ASUU), replacing them with stooges who would salute his ignoble onslaught. Also, the tenures of elected Deans of faculties will elapse in a week or two. As usual, since elections cannot hold to replace them due to the strike action, the VC has to appoint "acting" Deans and Sub-Deans, to stand in till elections can hold upon the suspension of the ASUU national strike and resumption. The introduction of Deanship elections in COOU was a hard-fought battle between ASUU and the immediate past Vice-chancellor (Prof Fidelis Okafor) which ASUU rightly prevailed. ASUU-COOU worryingly hopes that the much-touted "fair and just" Nwakoby government will be willing to do the needful and permit the conduct of Deanship elections to replace his about-to-be appointed cliques upon the suspension of the ASUU national strike and full resumption of academic activities. Failure to do so would lead to an avoidable misunderstanding with the Union again. Watch-out for in the coming days and weeks, the military execution of these despotic acts will begin (again these are undiluted truths).
Also, part of the propaganda that will rationalize the fake resumption charade is being hatched and executed through the Deputy Vice-Chancellor Academics and a few saboteur lecturers (shameless referring to themselves as "Proudly NWAKOBYTE"), who have been sent to go to the Uli and Igbariam campuses, put them in a class with less than 10% of the students and videotape the sham called lectures while in progress. When did scholars and academics reduce themselves to typical political jobbers who take video clips of lectures and submit to be noticed, in desperation to please their masters and deceive parents and students of a full resumption? Take a close look at the deplorable conditions of the classrooms in the uploaded lecture videos and you will agree with the striking lecturers that the university needs attention. Can the governor or his cronies send their children to such school? Next, these minority serfs or Nwakobytes may call for a shameless protest in support of their 'lord' in return for crumbs. What a pity! If only Nwakoby knows what these praise singers of his say in condemnation of his personality behind him, he would realize how lonely he is and retrace his steps. Unlike his predecessor (Prof Okafor from UNN) who has since been deserted by his hailers of the past, Nwakoby still has time to avoid them like a plague and change course.
Unfortunately, the extreme tendencies of this bitter and dirty COOU environment are that it exhumes the skeletons shielded in ancient cupboards of the past, sweeping to the public, forlorn matters previously swept under the carpet. And it has. Since it has become an all-out war, the battle line is drawn by the VC, some unrestrained factions have arisen in judgment, calling out the very nature of Professor Nwakoby's initially conflicted appointment. Little wonder ASUU-UNIZIK chapter where Nwakoby hails from are in jubilation of his unsuccessful attempt to become the UNIZIK Vice-chancellor and rightly sympathising with their ASUU-COOU compatriots.
His two-year stint, it has come to note, has been marked with unbridled nepotism, with a large number of the employment drawn from Nwakoby's zone of the state. Coincidentally, or not, the VC hails from the same constituency with the current Governor of Anambra State, Willie Obiano, and the Speaker of the state house of assembly (a Ph.D. student in COOU) explaining the rumours that employments are ordered from above, shots called by the governor or his wife, and scholarly slots used to compensate individuals who naturally have no business within the confinements of a university. Ironically, the same Nwakoby continuously laments about the poor monthly subvention, constant interference by the first family of the state, and infrastructural neglect of the school by the state government. He has even severally muted the idea of resigning his office in reaction to the disturbance of the wife of the governor and frustration due to the nonchalant attitude of the state government to the school. Recently, the Anambra Progressives Forum, an interventionist group, and assemblage of patriotic like-minds driven by symmetrical ideals to move Anambra State forward was convened by Senator Patrick Ifeanyi Ubah at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, commissioned an ultra-modern fully equipped isolation centers valued at over N500 million at the Nnamdi Azikiwe Teaching Hospital (NAUTH). This project was initially designed to cut across specific specialties in different health areas in tertiary institutions in Nnewi, Awka, Igbariam, and Nsugbe, which cuts across the three Senatorial zones in Anambra State. While the project was commission in NAUTH, the one is Nsugbe (Nwafor-Orizu College of Education) has been put on hold while the one supposed to takeoff at Igbariam (Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu University) was blocked at the directive of the governor. This is how the only university belonging to the state was denied this important opportunity and previous external support because the governor does not approve of it. Many similar interventions have slipped away because of political differences. Thankfully, Sen. Ifeanyi Ubah is no pushover and can corroborate this story if the VC denies it.
Worse, even, Prof Nwakoby has gone to bed with the cabal that once resisted his appointment to spite ASUU-COOU which, also, explains his belligerent refusal to constitute a Budget Monitoring committee for the university, as earlier advised, and to probe the cult that is seriously fingered to have embezzled a large chunk of the school's TETFUND intervention, running to the tune of #7 billion. This is no joke! The facts which have previously been made available to Prof Nwakoby are presently before him awaiting his response. It is now surprising that the 'action man' presently clamping down on ASUU-COOU and who parades himself as 'just and firm', has not barked on these issues, let alone bite. Perhaps the state government intervened against this move as a cover-up or Nwakoby is hiding a personal agenda. Alternatively, if the VC has developed cold feet to prosecute the matter, even as a lawyer, he should invite the EFCC or external auditors to step and do the job while he steps aside. This is still pending, feel free to confirm!
For the majority of teaching staff who are undecided out of fear of intimidation and victimisation by the authoritarian administrations, the union urges you to stand strong and let us collectively face our fears. Nwakoby has earlier boasted openly that he knows how to break the union in COOU and is in the process of fulfilling his threat. Do not allow his intentions and divisive agents make you a traitor. We know Prof Nwakoby can resume "no work, no pay", threaten suspension or even dismissal! This is the University of the GREAT IKEMBA and this is the time to draw from his bravery against tyranny and oppression. These threats and actions should not deter us or shake our resolve for the truth will always prevail and darkness will always give way to light. Remember that when we keep quiet or take an indifferent stand in the face of oppression, we have inadvertently taken sides with the oppressor. This is already playing out at the national level. Nwakoby is bent of destroying ASUU-COOU at all costs by the directive of the State government as he claims. If he succeeds (God forbid!), he will have a field day and return to his base in UNIZIK while COOU is left in tatters. Shun any meeting from any splinter group claiming to be affiliated to ASUU at the bidding of their paymaster. United we stand, divided we beg!
As for our beloved students, ASUU is for you and not against you. The struggle is for the government to improve the quality of university education in your interest. These leaders enjoyed the best training and education during their life development (free food, minimal tuition, conducive hostels, equipped laboratories, well-stocked libraries, stipends, academic freedom among others) but they have refused to make it available to the children of the average Nigerian household. This is why ASUU is fighting to make the government committed to financing and equipping public universities and avoid them becoming irrelevant like public primary and secondary schools. The government wants universities to increase tuition fees instead of funding these institutions. They are encouraging the proliferation of private universities which the average Nigerian family cannot afford. They send their children to the best schools around the globe to get the best training and allow universities in the country to rot. Their children return to occupy the best employments in juicy government positions like CBN, FIRS, NNPC among others, while they force you to manage N-Power, Trader-Moni, and other petty programmes. This only intensifies inequality and heightens the acute poverty situation in the country. Forget the threats of non-graduation, suspension, and expulsion and join ASUU to save education in the country. Students of COOU are even worse, try to visit universities around you (even state universities), and compare with COOU and understand why ASUU-COOU is fighting for you. Your Student Union Government and other faculty and Departmental bodies have been made useless and powerless, your finance has since been taken away from you, Anti-cult harass you, you can confirm you share stuffy classrooms, receive lectures under trees, compress yourselves in lecture halls with other departments due to lack of halls, you suffer from using poor laboratories and libraries, no internet access, insufficient hostels, shabby transportation facilities that make students lose their life when coming to school, harassment to put on uniforms like secondary school students, etc. We ask you, don't you pay school fees (a high one at that)? Are you satisfied with the way the school is? Our mumu never do? The VC only promises to graduate you and what else? We need to come together and save the school! Call those few students among you that have been forced or given some tips to resume classes to stay away. Any lecturer that forces you to resume and come for lectures this period, ask him/her what they stand to gain. Tell your parents and the public the true situation of the school so the right thing can be done. ASUU-COOU has decided to come public since the VC has blocked all means of communication with the ASUU-COOU and heightened the tension in the school, even the intervention of ASUU-Owerri Zone and ASUU National have fallen on deaf ears. The state government, traditional rulers, faith-based organizations, and the general public need to intervene in COOU to prevent a breakdown of law and order under the maladministration of Prof Nwakoby.
Lastly, in Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu University, a tertiary institution named after the Biafran warlord, new and real drums of war beats, but now of academic symphony, inciting and insulting the old spirits of scholarly decorum, abrogating all the senses and virtues that, ideally, should be upheld by these men now tramping them. What will happen next may not be clear and sure, but what is clear and sure is that what comes next will be more heinous than what has happened. With the chances of truce very slim, the unsheathed fangs may yet drip blood. Stay awake and vigilant to repel the attacks of Nwakoby and 'Nwakobytes'.
Aluta Continua! NO RETREAT, NO SURRENDER!!!
ASUU-COOU 2020 SCC
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B.A.,First Class Honours (English & Literary Studies);
M.A., Ph.D. (English Language);
M.Sc. (Legal, Criminological & Security Psychology);
Professor of Cultural Semiotics & Stylistics,
Department of English,
University of Ibadan.
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