•Carpet the PRO’s reaction to report

By Anayo Okoli, Regional Editor, South East

ENUGU- SOME Chief Lecturers at the Institute of management and Technology, IMT, Enugu have reacted angrily to what they see as shabby reaction to publication in Saturday Vanguard of August 5, 2023, which exposed many ills in the institution.

The lecturers said  rather than the watery reaction, the management would have  remained silent.

In a statement signed on their behalf by Basil Offir, and entitled “A man whose house in on fire does not chase rats- silence would have been better”, they said: “The attention of Chief Lecturers at the Institute of Management and Technology Enugu has just been drawn to the response of the Public Relations Officer of  the Institute under the canopy of the  Management of the Institute to the Vanguard reportage of 6/8/2023 on the horrific orgy of administrative and academic immorality to which the Institute was bonded by its current leadership from 2016 to date.

Accordingly, we feel that our sensibilities were insulted by the aforesaid response and wish to reply as hereunder set out.

”The entire response vide Daily Sun is timid and unpatriotic. First, the distraction  invested in explaining how the current Deputy Rector,  a Senior Lecturer with effect from January 2023 and a Deputy Rector from March 2023 emerged in same capacity undermines the eminent sacred stature that God donated to reason and took away from sentiment.

“How does the above explanation on the tainted process that foisted the Deputy Rector on his elders in rank and experience answer the grave charges of the frolic usurpation of the exclusive jurisdiction of the Academic Board of the Institute in several and unending seasons by a junta led by same Deputy Rector to commit Academic Fraud and to mismanage academic matters within his four months spell in office?.

How does the above explanation also answer the unambiguous common knowledge that he is a Senior Lecturer and accordingly prohibited by Section 9(2) of the Polytechnic Act as quoted by Vanguard from being appointed Deputy Rector of a Polytechnic under the supervisory purview of the National Board for Technical Education (NBTE)?

How does the above equally justify the common unchallenged knowledge that he was promoted to a Senior Lecturer in January, appointed Head of the Department of Business Administration and Management (BAM) department in same January, taken to the Academic Board  in same January as the candidate of the Rector and the immediate past Chairman of the Governing Council for appointment as Deputy Rector through political zoning which was not donated an iota of space by the Legislature in the entire 44 sections of the IMT Law. The purported interview by the Council, referred to by the PRO of the Institute, under the leadership and sway of the above-named architects  of this coup against the said Section 9(2) of the Polytechnic Act goes to no issue and therefore of no moment. 

“Vanguard isolated an instance of academic fraud at the Agric and Bio-Environmental Engineering Department. The tottering response of the PRO did not deny it. It rather in being evasive suggests that there could be other cases of this impunity in some other departments at the Institute. 

“The emotional energy wasted by the PRO in pursuing this trajectory of abdicating another meat  of the Vanguard publication on the worrisome issues of reckless corruptible spending and Managerial infirmities  to catalogue purported  civil works at the Institute has equally not answered  the question why in the abundance of fiscal boom over the past years  hapless  men and women  were made to undergo renewed slavery in the 21st century IMT under the toga of polluted grace of part-time teaching on a stipend of #45,000( that is #50,000 – #5,000 unremitted tax) in a semester of between 4 and five months.  

“We also didn’t see and receive any explanation from the PRO’s outbursts in the Daily Sun edition of 10/8/2023 to the failure of both the Rector and the Governing Council to retire over #200M proceeds from the unpatriotic disposal of the Institute’s property in Abuja. 

“Vanguard specifically raised the germane point that in fluctuating from a decision in April 2021 to an entirely different one in April 2022, the afore-stated revenue can’t be accounted for.

“As a matter of fact, the above episode is a subject of concluded investigations by the ICPC awaiting the Commission’s next action. 

“Vanguard also precisely raised the issue of over #100M spent to procure severance cars for  Prof. Nweze(Rector),   Dr. Innocent Eze(Librarian), Mr. Sunday Ede(Bursar)etc. The PRO didn’t address this. 

“For avoidance of doubt, the above sad tale of our present woes was also conclusively investigated by the ICPC from December 2022 to February 2023 awaiting the next action of the Commission.

“Vanguard also precisely raised massive fraud cases including but not limited to purchase of National Youth Service mobilization by non-graduates of the institute. The PRO evaded this  and by so doing admitted it as the law inevitably puts it.

“ We must state that image repair, where the one to repair or launder actually exists, cannot flourish in falsity and lack of probity. The PRO is still a young man and with a very young family and should not chart this immoral path with karmic consequences to defend the ruins so far inflicted on the institute by his pay master. 

“The PRO was present in the 169th regular meeting of the Academic Board just held about two weeks ago.  He heard the  lacerations of despondency from Dr. Ifeanyi Ojobo that  many students already offered admission by the institute into HND programs did not graduate from their ND courses because they failed some subjects which they were unable to clear. 

“Dr. Ojobo”s aforesaid position was collaborated by the Chairperson of the Admissions Committee Mrs. Clara Agbo who informed the Board as follows: “Dr. Ojobo’s observation is correct. The Deputy Rector directed us to release the names of all the persons that applied for admission and jettison our hitherto principle of verifying their results with our Exam Unit which according to the Deputy Rector was an unnecessary delay”.  The Deputy Rector was glued to his seat and refused to respond. The Rector set up a committee to go and fish out the concerned persons. 

“The above was the intriguing movie that we all witnessed at the said AB meeting. This raises the question that Vanguard called on the entire nation to answer and which was whether there is any image left in our tank to preserve in public interest. Curiously, the PRO found this strand of patriotism by Vanguard offensive rather than complimentary on the Constitutional obligation to eschew immorality and impunity under Section 15(5) of the 1999 Constitution. 

“What has the above diet of epic disgust gotten to do  with alleged unretired cash advance  which according to the Rector was purported to have happened over ten years ago when he the Rector was in ESUT or elsewhere but definitely not in lMT. According to the Rector, this was an issue from the undisclosed report of the Auditor General of Enugu State for year 2013 when again the Rector was not in office. According to the Rector also, 24 staff were listed in that report as having allegedly failed to retire cash advances allegedly given to them over ten years ago. unfortunately and because this screen shot is powered by malice, the Rector has rudely refused to disclose to the 24 accused persons the purported audit  report and to confront the accused staff with payment vouchers of the over ten years purported cash advances evidencing their culpability. If this is not administrative lawlessness precinct on brazen violation of the constitutional  right of the staff to fair hearing which Section 31 of the Enugu State Audit Law 2021 also acknowledged must be respected in audit matters, we don’t know of any other name to give it. 

“As a Chartered Accountant, the Rector is believed to know that cash advances are matters of the fiscal instrument of payment vouchers and not of his whims and caprices. We understand that this matter is pending at the Appeal Court Enugu and we are required by our training as academics and respect for the Rule of Law to stay off and allow the Appeal Court to determine the matter one way or the other.   

“ However, we are aware that the PRO knows that for over four years since the Rector assumed office in 2016, he refused/failed/neglected to submit audited financial statements of the institute to the Auditor General of Enugu State as required of him by Section 37(3) of the Audit Law of Enugu State 2021. This is also an obligation placed on the Rector by Section 125 (3) of the 1999 Constitution. Under, the Enugu State Audit law this gross abuse of office which shuns transparency and accountability amounts to felony.  The Rector had been requested to respond to this issue and other fermented ones of equally unwholesome texture vide a report that he received over three weeks ago from the office of the SSG but he has chosen not to.

 “The PRO is a lawyer. He also knows that the jurisdiction on audit of the accounts of public institutions owned by the Enugu State government such as lMT and issues thereto falls exclusively on the Auditor General of Enugu State. He is the one to issue a query and to call for explanations where he deems it fit to so do under Section 30(1)(h). And under the most germane Section 31(1), it is provided as follows: “The Auditor General shall have power to (2) subject to the fair hearing provisions of the Constitution (d) surcharge the amount of any loss or deficiency upon any person by whose negligence or misconduct the loss or deficiency has been incurred” and (f) “direct the withholding of the emoluments and allowances of persons who fail or refuse to reply to Audit queries within 30 days and for as long as the persons fail to comply”. In the queries given to 24 staff, the Rector admitted issuance of queries to him as the Accounting Officer of the institute over the years and that he was unable to reply. His emoluments and salaries were curiously not withheld. The law was suspended for him on ethnic and nepotistic justification. This happened within the tenure of the immediate past Government of Enugu State. From this angle alone,  Vanguard is not to blame for reporting the genuine belief of the staff of the institute across ethnic and political divide that the immediate past Enugu State Government supported the Rector in his clear devastation of the institute and the welfare of the staff. 

“Under the watch of the said Government, the Rector and the above-mentioned officers of the institute ostensibly diverted part of the monies for the payment of owed  CONTISS arrears to procure take-home cars at #32M each. #32M would have paid at least 100 staff their own CONTISS arrears. We don’t know of any other evidence of fiscal rascality and impunity that the PRO was demanding from Vanguard and why he should desperately run to Daily Sun for undeserved succour.  All we can see from this suspect disposition and conduct is a shameless voyage of a rejoinder which rather than shield further image injuries of the Institute over the past six years radically  exposed more  our present sordid and dark momentum and moral crucifixion.

“We passionately appeal to the Enugu State Government to  set up as  a matter of urgency a  judicial Panel of Enquiry to look into the administration of IMT from June 2016 to date. We assure the State Government that findings will celebrate Vanguard and vanquish the PRO and his pay master. ln the alternative, a state of emergency should be declared in lMT in public intetest.

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