ASUU in Anambra varsity alleges threat from management, holds congress in hideout

Says half-baked graduates end up as Yahoo boys
The Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu University (COOU), Anambra State chapter of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), has said it held its congress in a hideout, as management threatened to cow them into submission over its insistence on the one-month nationwide warning strike.

Chairman of ASUU at COOU, Prof. Okey Aniebo, who spoke to The Guardian after its congress in a hideout to which they relocated after the members alleged intimidation and harassment in two previous meetings at the Igbariam campus of the university, said security agencies had been briefed on the development.

Aniebo alleged that the Vice Chancellor, Prof. Greg Nwakoby, was showing autocratic tendencies and encouraging militarisation of the university, to the point that the armed anti-cult squad, Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC) and other unarmed and armed youths now move round with him to meetings.

While asserting that there is only one ASUU whose decisions stand, he said: “Our national body has continued to identify with him as Chairman of ASUU in COOU and dissociated itself from the so-called Progressive Academic Staff fronted by the Vice Chancellor and led by Deputy Vice Chancellor, Prof. Osita Chiaghanam.”

Aniebo, who showed evidence of threats and disruptions of its meetings, explained that ASUU of COOU relocated to a hideout in the face of alleged engagement of armed youth to monitor, intimidate and harass his members over their decision to join the nationwide strike.

He further accused the Chiaghanam-led group of mobilising armed youths to accompany him to invade ASUU Secretariat where ASUU COOU was holding its meeting and upturned the table.

He stressing that after the members shifted from the Political Science Hall to the campus gate to conclude its meeting and address journalists on the development, the lecturers maintain their ground.

“It is only in COOU that a Deputy Vice Chancellor can take up arm against his colleagues in a meeting, because we rejected Nwakoby’s peace move and he wants to do the bidding of the governor to scatter ASUU, just to allow his two children to graduate,” he said.

Responding to the development, immediate past Chairman of ASUU in the institution, Emeka Nwabunnia, affirmed Aniebo’s claims on intimidation and use of armed operatives to stop the pro-ASUU strike agitation.

He accused Nwakoby of managing a ghost-like institution bereft of sufficient government funding, adequate infrastructure, enabling environment, motivated workforce and ill-prepared graduates, among others.