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Tag: Edward Aihevba

  • AAU: Suspended ASUU Chairman opens can of worms

    …He is drowning, says Varsity

     

    Suspended Chairman of the Academic Staff Union of Universities, Ambrose Alli University chapter, Prof. Monday Igbafen, on Thursday opened can of worms on the institution in his attempt to fight back.

    Prof. Igbafen, an Associate Professor in the Department of Philosophy, was suspended for alleged sexual harassment.

    Speaking to newsmen in Benin City, Prof. Igbafen said he was being victimized for asking the Vice Chancellor, Prof. Ignacious Onimawo, to account for the about N5.5billion received from TETFUND and NEEDS Assessment intervention funds.

    Prof. Igbafen said his fallout with Prof. Onimawo was because of his non compromising approach to acts of impunity exhibited by the VC.

    Read Also: FG, ASUU urged to keep agreements

    Igbafen said wife of the Vice Chancellor was elevated to the position of lecturer 1 from a position of a typist.

    According to him, “We (ASUU) challenged him to be open and transparent. You cannot move your wife from nowhere and make her a lecturer 1 without a PHD and academic master’s degree. We have been on the matter and he has made attempts to compromise me as the chairman of the union and I refused.

    “That led to his desperation that to insist that I should never be chairman of ASUU for a second time.

    “The university has collected more than N5.5billion for the past five years. From the TETFUND he has received more than N3.4billion while that from NEEDS Assessment is more than N1.2billion.

    “The union is demanding for how he has utilized these funds. Is it a sin to demand for how he has utilised our funds?”

    But spokesman for the university, Mr. Edward Aihevba, said there are other charges against Prof. Igbafen but the issue of sexual harassment was as a result of a petition from the victim’s family.

    Aihevba said the victim and her mother testified before a panel but the former administration did not look into the report.

    He said the VC has been prudent in administering intervention funds from NEEDs Assessment and TETFUND.

    According to him, “Prof. Igbafen should not be shouting. He is afraid that he is sinking. He should face the music. There are other things he did and at the appropriate time, he will be made to answer for them

    “The VC’s wife entered the university as a young lady. She got her degrees and was converted by a former administration and not her husband. She got her PhD and was made Lecturer 1.”

    Aihevba urged Prof. Igbafen to get proper education on how intervention funds are utilized within a university system.

  • AAU suspends ASUU chairman over alleged sexual assault

    Authorities of the Ambrose Alli University ( AAU  ), Ekpoma have suspended the institution’s chairman of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) Prof. Monday Igbafen over alleged sexual harassment.

    Prof. Igbafen who is an Associate Professor in the Department of Philosophy was alleged to have been threatening female students with marks for sex.

    A press statement signed by the university’s spokesman, Mr. Edward Aihevba, said the suspension followed the arraignment of Prof. Igbafen before the Senior Staff Disciplinary Committee (SSDC) on allegations of gross misconduct bordering on sexual harassment and threat of marks for sex.

    Aihevba said Prof. Igbafen has earlier been found culpable and indicted by an investigative panel of the University for the Offence of sexual harassment.

    He said a family of a female victim had threatened to drag the institution before the ICPC if it failed to bring Prof. Igbafen to book.

    According to the statement, “On receipt of the petition, the university management asked for his comments. His response was found unsatisfactory. He was therefore arraigned before the SSDC.

    “As due process demands, he has been suspended from the university pending the determination of the allegation leveled against him.

    “He is therefore not allowed to participate or involved in any university duties or functions except those related to SSDC during the period of his suspension.”

    Responding, Prof. Igbafen said he would expose the Vice Chancellor, Professor Ignacious Onimawo, to the world that blackmail does not work within the university.

    Prof. Igbafen said the suspension was part of a grand plan to intimidate ASUU chapter of the university.

    He said the VC has a personal vendetta against him.

    Read Also: AAU to resume Sunday as some dons ditch ASUU for CONUA

    According to him, “It is a grand plot that will fail. The VC is desperate because he has so many things to hide. He is looking for a weak ASUU to manipulate.

    “That petition was written against two of us when I was a Lecturer II in 2011. I answered it that my hands are clean. Is that why he is denying me of my promotion?

    “All these things are plot to destabilise the Union. It is a cheap blackmail. The VC is desperate to decimate ASUU. I know he is behind all the petitions against me.”

  • Varsity accuses ASUU of plotting to destabilise institution

    Management of the Ambrose Alli University (AAU), Ekpoma, Edo State has accused the leadership of the institution’s  Academic Staff Union Universities (ASUU) of engaging in deliberate smear campaign to tarnish the image of the university and its management.

    It said the Chairman and Secretary of ASUU-AAU, Dr. Monday Igbafen and Dr. Anthony Coker are pursuing a centrifugal agenda against the administration of the present Vice Chancellor and his family.

    A statement signed by university’s spokesman, Mr. Edward Aihevba said the duo were focused on destabilizing the university system and making AAU ungovernable through “their epistles of blackmail and war-mongering has libeled many,  and dragged the name of the university to the mud”.

    Aihevba said the ASUU chairman wrote letters to the Council of Legal Education and the National Universities Commissions (NUC) in alleged effort to degrade and smear some of the university’s academic programmes, the Governing Council, Senate and university management.

    Read Also: ASUU suspends strike after deal with Fed Govt

    He said the university management would not fold it’s hands and watch anybody destabilise the university under the guise of trade unionism.

    “The university community is thoroughly appalled at the series of malicious, libelous, insultive, unguarded and damaging statements made against the person of the vice chancellor, his family members, the university management and indeed the university as a whole by the chairman of ASUU-AAU, Dr. Igbafen and secretary of ASUU-AAU Dr. A. A. Comer and a few his cohorts.

    “Their atrocious proclamations and malicious vituperation against the university are streaming in the social media and the newspapers. The image of the university is being rubbished and denigrated”, the statement read.

    Reacting, Prof. Igbafen described the allegations as untrue and unfounded.

    Prof. Igbafen stated that it was the school management that disrupted ASUU Congress by sponsoring thuggery.

    He said the union was happy that the strike was called of and full academic work has commenced.

  • AAU killings: Varsity confirms death of two students

    Management of the Ambrose Alli University, Ekpoma, has confirmed that two of its students died in the shooting that occurred at a bar in Ekpoma town.

    It said the other three victims were former students of the institution.

    The university management said the killings was as a result of a quarrel between friends in a Bar and not cult related.

    A statement by the Public Relations Officer of the institution, Mr. Edward Aihevba, said that Police investigations revealed that the incident was not cult-related and was not a jubilation party by graduating students.

    Aihevba noted that the University Management was embarrassed by the newspapers’ reports that have painted the institution in bad light.

    He said the institution does not condone wild jubilation and that it is totally safe and devoid of cultism or social indecorum.

    According to the statement, The University management condemns in totality, the dastardly acts perpetrated by the hoodlums and the senseless killings and we trust that the law enforcement machinery will fish them out to face the full wrath of the law.

    “It is unfortunate that the casualties include two students of Ambrose Alli University (not graduating) and three ex-student (past graduates). It is necessary to state clearly and unequivocally that cultism does not exist in Ambrose Alli University any more.

    “We state categorically and emphatically that the incident did not occur within our University and the meeting of friends that ran foul of the law of the land could have taken place anywhere in the world.

    “We commiserate with the families of the deceased and we pray Almighty God to grant them the fortitude to bear the irreparable loss.”

  • Two AAU students die in campus accident

    Two AAU students die in campus accident

    Tragedy occurred at the Ambrose Alli University, Ekpoma when two students died while 16 others suffered injuries in an accident that occurred within the campus.

    The accident was said to have occurred when one of school’s shuttle buses lost control due to alleged brake failure and somersaulted several times.

    One of the deceased was identified as Ebere, a 300 level student of Educational Foundation Management.

    A source said the other student died at the hospital they were rushed to.

    Spokesperson of the institution, Mr.  Edward Aihevba, who confirmed the incident said a committee has been set up to investigate the immediate and remote cause(s) of the accident.

    He noted that appropriate actions would be taken at the end of the investigations.

    Some students who spoke on condition of anonymity described the incident as sad.

  • Edo CP’s claim on lecturer’s arrest false, embarrassing – Varsity

    Management of the Ambrose Alli University, Ekpoma has demanded an apology from the Edo State Commissioner of Police, Haliru Gwandu, over claims that arms and ammunition were recovered from some lecturers in the university.

    The institution threatened to institute legal action against the police commissioner if the apology was not tendered.

    A statement signed by Public Relations Officer of the institution, Mr. Edward Aihevba, debunked all the claims made by Gwandu as “totally false and embarrassing.”

    The statement said the institution has not recorded any cult-related activities since the inception of the administration of Prof. Ignatius Onimawo.

    It said there was no report from the Police Force or any individual or groups about any incident of cultism or cult-related activities.

    The institution said, “The Police Commissioner and his team could not have arrested any staff of the university, or found 14 students dead and not make a report, formal or informal, to the authorities of Ambrose Alli University.

    “The police commissioner, by his pronouncement has opened the way for damaging and libelous display of falsehood in the social media.

    “We want to assure the general public that there is and there has been peace within and around the university environment.  There is no cult activity and no death of any student in the university.

    “Currently, the first semester examinations are going on in a peaceful manner and students are going about their academic duties peacefully.”