By POPOOLA YAQOUB, Ado Ekiti

The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) has alleged fresh plot by the outgoing Vice Chancellor of the Federal University, Oye-Ekiti (FUOYE), Professor Kayode Soremekun, to sustain the culture of impunity on the nascent citadel of learning. Soremekun’s tenure expires as VC in February 2021.

Addressing journalists at ASUU Secretariat in Ekiti State University on weekend, the Coordinator of ASUU, Akure Zone, Prof Olu Olu Olufayo accused Soremekun of deploying unsavoury tactics to scheme his perceived enemies out of the VC contest for obvious reasons.

The union said Soremekun had allegedly been running the university like a private entity and promoting the culture of ethnicity, nepotism, financial recklessness and abridgement of due process for personal aggrandizement.

But the Vice Chancellor had seen dismissed all the allegations claiming that there were such plots to perpetuate himself in office.

Reacting through his Deputy Director, Corporate Services, Adeyinka Ademuyiwa, the VC explained that Prof Fasina is not being imposed by anybody.

ASUU said Soremekun had perfected the plan to circumvent all due processes to ensure that his anointed candidate Professor Abayomi Fasina the current Deputy Vice Chancellor take over from him.

Olufayo also alleged that Soremokun, in his desperate bid to hatch his plot had thrown decorum into the winds.

“About 70 Professors applied, nine were shortlisted, but we learnt Prof Fasina came first. In the advertorial, Professors from State universities were shut out from applying. We won’t resort to brigandage, but we will continue to speak against despotism, disorderliness, brutishness and arm-twisting at FUOYE.

“We call on President Muhammadu Buhari to urgently stop the impunity and the attempt to institutionalize same at FUOYE. For some time now, ASUU has been calling out different agencies of government to address the rot, extraordinary corruption, ineptitude and moral decadence at the University under the direction of Profs Soremekun, Fasina and a host of others. If this is left unchecked, it would be a fallacy to address FUOYE as a University.

“Under Professors Soremekun and Fasina, FUOYE has become an enslaved and conquered territory where academic freedom has long been mortgaged to nepotism, parochialism and patronage.

“Soremekun and Fasina have continued to run a private enterprise and surprisingly, as the tenure of the VC is coming to an end, we learnt that there are clandestine plans to enthrone Prof. Fasina as an anointed successor in a bid to enshrine a dynasty of impunity.

“Prof Fasina assumed duty at EKSU on 2nd February 2000 on a visiting appointment as a Senior Lecturer and given a permanent appointment on 2nd January 2002. The appointment was confirmed in 2005 and he has promoted Professor in 2007.

“He was granted sabbatical appointment in FUOYE from 2nd January 2015 to terminate on 31st December 2015. He sought for and got an extension to utilize his deferred accumulated leave still at FUOYE between 4th January and 22nd September 2016. He duly returned to EKSU on the 23rd of September 2016 and later absconded in the same month till now.

“EKSU was embarrassed to discover his abscondment which led to the stoppage of his salary in October 2017. It should be on record that during this period i.e. October 2016 to February 2017, he received full salaries as a Professor in both institutions.

“Between March 2017 and August 2017, he was paid as a visiting Lecturer in FUOYE and a full Professor in EKSU. FUOYE later reinstated him on a full Professor’s salary from September 2017 till date while EKSU terminated his salary in October 2017 following the discovery of abscondment.

“Our investigations revealed that there is no document in the annals of EKSU to support any official disengagement from the university before he took up a supposed full-time appointment with FUOYE from September 2017.

Soremekun added that the process of getting a new VC has begun and hopeful of the emergence of a new VC from this ‘transparent’ process, saying the Zonal ASUU, which commanded poor followership among lecturers in FUOYE lacks the credibility to impose anyone on the institution through incessant attacks and obnoxious practices.

Fasina, who allegedly absconded from the Ekiti State University (EKSU) in 2015 and collected double salaries running into a sum of N3.4 million from the two universities for about six months lacks the requisite integrity to be appointed a Vice Chancellor.

“Fasina was granted sabbatical appointment in FUOYE from 2nd January 2015 to terminate on 31st December 2015. He sought for and got an extension to utilize his deferred accumulated leave still at FUOYE between 4th January and 22nd September 2016. He duly returned to EKSU on the 23rd of September 2016 and later absconded in the same month till now”.

Defending FUOYE further, Soremekun said Fasina did not collect double salaries as being alleged, adding that the case is already in court and it is sub-judice and contemptuous to make it a subject of discussion.

Soremekun disclosed that the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) as well as the University Governing Council had investigated the matter and made respective pronouncements on this issue which Akure ASUU keeps unsatisfied with clean bill given to the Deputy VC.

“Prof Soremekun recently head-hunted an Ekiti Professor of political Science from EKSU. This is someone he does not know prior to coming to FUOYE and had no other relationship. The VC bent backwards to recruit this Ekiti Scholar by giving his personal resources to this gentleman so that he can exit his previous employment contract. Where then is the ethnic bias? Where also is the nepotism?

“The requirement that the coming VC should preferably have experience in Federal University prior to applying is based on changing challenges of this time. It should be noted here that the operative phrase is: preferably federal and this connotes a measure of inclusion and does not take thick-headedness to appreciate this.

“The raised issues are over-flogged. Nothing new is being said by these tired characters who pose as scholars. Each time FUOYE is making a huge leap to consolidate on previous gains, misguided characters masquerading as scholars who channelled their energies on frivolities try to deny, delay or distract us from such achievements.” (Daily Independent)

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