House Listen to our VC's Address!

We’ll make UNN among the best – DVC

Academic activities have commenced in the University of Nigeria, Nsukka (UNN), one month after it was closed down following students’ demonstration on January 16, 2010. The Vice-Chancellor, Prof Bartho Okolo, shortly after the demonstration that turned violent had told Daily Sun that the unfortunate incident was orchestrated by a few mischief-makers, who were giving him a bad name.

He recalled that upon assumption of office last June, he had started to reconstruct the premier institution in order to make it conducive for teaching and learning, saying that under his short period in office they have given the university a face-lift.
Despite the unfortunate unrest, Prof Okolo assured that he would not rest on his oars until he achieves his heart desire of placing UNN among the best higher institutions of learning in the world.
Speaking in the same vein, his Deputy, (Academics), Prof Issac Asuzu, blamed the UNN students’ riot on unfounded rumour.
According to him, Prof Okolo is setting a new pace in the institution which would bring new hope to both students and staff.
He also revealed that the Okolo administration has already concluded plans to re-train their academic and non-staff members abroad.
Prof Asuzu also threw light on the UNN riot, what the university authorities are doing to better the lot of students and staffers, among others.
Exerpts:

The new dawn at UNN
We were part of Prof. Nebo’s administration. Both of us were deputy vice chancellors then. Our administration is not different from that of Prof Nebo. We are pursuing the same objectives and goals. Within the short period, we have completed a number of projects, some of them started during the Nebo administration. At the hostels, most of their roofs were dilapidated. We have re-roofed them. The hostels’ toilet ends were blocked. We opened them and they are now working. This administration has also extended water to parts of the staff quarters where there was no pipe-borne water. Pipes were laid to extend water to those areas. Also, we have improved upon the street lighting system, thereby enhancing security on campus at night. Our streets are now safer at night.

Rumour on fees hike
What was central to this problem was that the students said they heard that the university was going to increase school fees. There was nothing like that. As deputy Vice-Chancellor, Academics, I am part of the administration; we have never in any of our meetings deliberated on increasing school fees. Secondly, we cannot even increase school fees and begin to implement without the proposal going to the council. The council must ratify any such proposal before you implement. It was only rumour, where that rumour came from, I don’t know. It is most unfortunate. Whatever happened was based on ignorance. Hopefully, peace has returned and we will never allow such gap in information management again.

Relationship between Prof Nebo and Prof Okolo
It is a blatant lie that Prof. Okolo walked out Prof. Nebo out from his office. What I have found here is that there are a lot of rumours flying about. Prof. Nebo and Prof. Okolo are in a very good relationship. Recently, when we were going round to inspect the damage done to the university property by the students, Prof. Nebo was in the team and at the end of that tour, the Chairman of Council, Prof. Igwe, Prof. Okolo, and other members of the council, principal officers, invited Nebo to the council meeting as an observer. We are working in very good relationship with the former VC and his relationship with Prof. Okolo is very, very cordial. Prof. Barth Okolo and the present administration is working very closely with Prof. Nebo. Prof Bath Okolo will be the last person to walk Prof. Nebo out of his office. So, this is part of the destructive rumour going round the university.

New deal underway for staff
The Vice-Chancellor will release the university’s master-plan soon. We have a plan on ground to improve on the staff welfare. Part of the new package for staff has started unfolding; we now have plans to send our academic staff abroad, both academic and non-academic for training. Their counterparts will also come here to interact with us for cross fertilization of ideas because we want to move and we want to make the university the best in Africa.

The panel of inquiry
I do not want to go into anything within the terms of reference of the administrative panel of inquiry. I do not want to pre-empt the panel. The job of the panel is to look impartially at what happened and come up to say this and that was damaged by students or that nothing was damaged by them. I think based on that, there may be reparation or no reparation. We have given them a free hand to operate.

Message to the university community
What I will tell my fellow members of the university community is that all hands must be on deck; what has happened is unfortunate. The dream to bring this university to a level where it will be the best in the world will continue to be our priority. They should not act on rumours. When they hear rumour, they should investigate it before believing it and acting on it.

To the Nsukka community where we are, we are pleased they gave the land upon which the university is established. They are also our neighbours. I assure them that whatever we can do to extend municipal services to them, this administration will not fail to do it. Nobody is trying to remove any faculty to Enugu. I think the issue has since been put to rest. We look forward to a good working relationship between the university and the host community.

Our academic achievement
In this area, we have achieved so much within a short period of time. We identified areas for collaboration with universities abroad. Soon after his inauguration, the Vice Chancellor travelled extensively outside the country to some countries in Europe and Asia.
A number of universities abroad have agreed to collaborate with us on exchange programmes, our students are benefiting from this, some of them have gained scholarship under this arrangement to study aboard, one university in the United States of America has also agreed to train all our staff who are Masters students for Ph. D free.

Enhancement of campus aesthetics
Universities all over the world are known for their beautiful environments with flowers, grasses and so on. Even in Nigeria, if you go to Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, you will find out that it is a beautiful campus. We also believe that if you are in a beautiful environment, it helps you to study better. We had to demolish some illegal structures that were littered here and there. We decided to concentrate all the businesses in an area designed as business district. Before now, everywhere on campus was filled with illegal structures. We were misunderstood by the people who decided to peddle rumour only to paint us black. We had since discovered that they were acting on ignorance because they were not properly informed.

	UNIVERSITY OF NIGERIA COMMUNITY To Restore The Dignity of Man	Welcome, Guest. Please login or register. May 23, 2012, 00:17:27 AM
Home AfricaEd.com UNN.EDU.NG PHOTO GALLERY Calendar Login Register