By STANLEY NWANOSIKE

Prof. Charles Eze, the Acting Vice-Chancellor of Enugu State University of Science and Technology (ESUT), said the institution had promoted 11 of its lecturers, who had been associate professors to the rank of professors.

The vice-chancellor disclosed this in Enugu on Sunday while speaking with newsmen during a programme tagged: “Celebration of Excellent Leadership”.

Eze also said that 31 other lecturers were also promoted to the position of associate professors.

The event was organised by the MSc and PhD students of the university’s Institute for Peace, Conflict and Development Studies in honour of its Director, Prof. Felix Asogwa.

The vice-chancellor explained that the newly-elevated professors and associate professors were people who were overdue for the promotion since 2015, 2016, 2017, among other years but were stagnated for quite a long time by successive administrations in the university.

According to him, stagnating workers for a long time is not the best in any system, whether academic or non-academic environment, because it affects productivity adversely.

“As the Acting vice-chancellor of ESUT, I found myself as a wheeling tool to do the needful and give them what they merited and deserve and today, the beneficiaries are happy for it,’’ he said.

Eze, who was also conferred with the award of “Pragmatic and Excellent Leadership’’, expressed satisfaction with activities of the institute which he said, was barely a year old.

The vice-chancellor noted that as a university under his watch for now, the authorities would not hesitate to always assist the institute from the available little resources.

He said that the institute had a great role to play in tackling conflicts in parts of the country via its products (graduates) and called on all and sundry to always give the management the necessary support.

In his remark, Asogwa appreciated the organisers, particularly the Institute’s Coordinator, Researchers’ Forum, Mr Chiedozie Nwafor, a PhD student, for packaging the ceremony in his honour, in spite of the challenges posed by COVID-19.

He noted that no nation, be it developed or developing, including Nigeria could make any meaningful headway or development in an atmosphere of crisis.

According to him, peace should always remain paramount in all we do as a people.

Other speakers, who were mainly professors and facilitators at the institute, applauded the organisers and urged the university management to take the issue of adequate funding of the institute seriously, as it was the only way it could achieve desired results.

Nwafor said: “It is not contestable that the institute is first of its kind in the South East, and it will continue to produce worthy ambassadors that will keep exporting the excellence the university is known for’’.

Other award recipients at the ceremony included Enugu State Commissioner of Police, Ahmad Abdurrahman, who is also a PhD student of the institute; Baywood Foundation and the Executive Director, West Africa Network for Peace Building, Dr Chukwuemeka Eze, among others. (NAN)

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