The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) has commended the President and Visitor to the University of Lagos (UNILAG), Muhammadu Buhari, for recognising the role of the institution’s Senate in its governance.
In an interview, the Chairman, ASUU-UNILAG, Dr. Dele Ashiru said it was praiseworthy that Buhari allowed due process by respecting the legal role of the Senate – a role that the suspended Governing Council chairman, Dr. Wale Babalakin failed to recognise.
He said: “It is a right step in the right direction. Worth gratifying is the recognition of the position of the Senate as a critical organ in the governance structure of the University.
“The same Senate which Wale Babalakin treated with disdain, with contempt, with absolute lack of respect, the Visitor of the University through the Honourable Minister should be commended for standing firm in defense of the rule of law – particularly by asking Senate to reconvene with a view to selecting an Acting Vice-chancellor in compliance with the law.”
Ashiru added that with the Visitation panel all accused would be given fair hearing.
“An accused is deemed innocent until he or she is proven guilty. This visitation panel will afford each party the opportunity to give their own side of the story,” he said.
Regarding the Acting Vice-Chancellor, Prof. Theophilus Soyombo’s statement that he had step aside, Ashiru said he was not recognized by the law in the first place.
“And for the so-called vice-chancellor – the surrogate vice-chancellor, he need not step down because he never existed in the face of the law,” he said.
When asked to react to the backing out of the Non Academic Staff Union (NASU) and the Senior Staff Association of Nigerian Universities (SSANU) from the joint resolution of workers’ congress to protest Prof. Toyin Ogundipe’s sack, Ashiru said: “That question should be better answered by SSANU and NASU. But I feel sorry for them. I feel very sorry for them,” he said.
On his part, NASU-UNILAG chairman, Comrade Kehinde Ajibade, said: “It is a good welcome and good development.”
Commenting on the matter, SSANU Chairman, Sola Sowunmi, said the union is calling for calm among it’s members and prayers for the University for the bad publicity.
Source: The Nation
