A coalition of 25 Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) has called on President Bola Tinubu through the Minister of Education to intervene in the ongoing controversy surrounding the selection of a Vice – Chancellor for the University of Abuja (UniAbuja).
The coalition under the aegis of Civil Society Coalition for Educational Development said this during the presentation of their report by one of its members, Dr. Wisdom Chinedu at the main gate of the University on Friday in Abuja.
It criticised recent protests by some professors at the university, calling their actions as “unnecessary and counter productive.”
Chinedu, who spoke on behalf of the coalition, said the protest was part of a deliberate effort to undermine the reputation of the Acting Vice-Chancellor of the University, Professor Aisha Maikudi.
“We demand that President Bola Tinubu, through the Honourable Minister of Education, wade into the ensuing crisis and give needed protection for the acting Vice Chancellor who is obviously a victim of ethnic gang-up, political orchestration, and desperate power mongers in the University of Abuja. This will prevent any attempts to ridicule his efforts in promoting youth and women’s leadership,” the coalition said.
It said: “We wish to begin by expressing unequivocally, our frustration and disappointment over the recent protest by some professors from University of Abuja over the appointment of a substantive Vice Chancellor in the institution.
“It is an absurdity and a direct attack on due process, betrayal of their experience, and direct assault on the globally demanded agenda to have more women and youths in leadership.
“We observed with incontrovertible evidence that the entire protest is about an orchestrated plan to discredit Prof. Aisha Maikudi, the acting Vice Chancellor who had previously served as Deputy Vice Chancellor without any record of failure or non-qualification. The desperation to pull her down because she is a woman, a youth, and a northerner is antithetical to the development of education in Nigeria, especially at a time when global attention is on harnessing the numerous potentials of young people, especially women, to boost growth.
