President Bola Ahmed Tinubu and major stakeholders in Abia State have been called upon to intervene in the leadership crisis rocking Michael Okpara University of Agriculture, Umudike (MOUAU) before it snowballs into massive protests by both students and parents.
There are reports that the Governing Council Chairman, Comrade Fidelis Edeh, is stalling development in the institution through the pursuit of vendetta against the Vice Chancellor, Prof. Maduebibisi Iwe, and his core loyalists, including Dr. Philips Nto, whose promotion to the rank of professor has been withheld allegedly by the Council Chairman.
In a statement issued in Umuahia on Monday, a pressure group, Abia Democratic Alliance, raised the alarm that the activities of Comrade Edeh were not only derailing development of the institution but were capable of igniting security breaches.
In the statement signed by the Chairman, Nze Theophilus Nkire, and the Secretary, Mazi Kanu Okoroafor, the group carpeted a former Deputy Chairman of Ikwuano Local Government Area, Hon. Tony Alaribe, and his Ikwuano League of Professionals for engaging in pathetic sycophancy bordering on sabotage for denying that there was a crisis in the university.
The Abia Democratic Alliance described as unfortunate Alaribe’s “self-serving statement that those calling for investigations into what is happening in MOUAU are fanning the embers of war.”
“It is either that Alaribe is ignorant or that he has been compromised. It is either that he is aiding the total destruction of the university for pecuniary gains or he has sold his conscience to the enemies of Abia State,” the group lamented.
It said that unless Alaribe and his group were comfortable with the peace of the graveyard in the university, they should ask questions why there has not been any single TETFund project executed in MOUAU since Edeh took over as Council Chairman.
According to the group, “The nearby Research Institute utilised all their 2024 capital projects and has even gone ahead to do the ones for 2025. Alaribe should go there to see research working, fencing the entire place and rebuilding the gates. They also have a board chairman. How come MOUAU has not done any project since Edeh resumed as the Chairman in 2024?”
It noted that the most annoying issue is that a multi-million naira constituency project attracted by Senator Austin Akobundu, an Ikwuano son, has not been executed because Edeh has refused to approve the award for the contracts just like other several projects.
It also pointed to the recent dragging of feet by Edeh for the recruitment of staff after the positions had been advertised and thousands of people applied.
According to the group, it was the same delay tactics that Edeh used in 2024 to deny the employment of 150 staff after the Ministry of Education had granted MOUAU that waiver.
“Unknown to Tony Alaribe and his unpatriotic co-travellers, majority of Ikwuano sons and daughters would have been beneficiaries of that employment, yet they are shamelessly defending their oppressor.”
The group also referred to the unilateral cancellation of the convocation of the university by Edeh as a possible security threat, knowing fully well that parents and graduates had already made arrangements to attend the event.
It noted that time has come for Tinubu and Abia stakeholders to intervene in the stalemate that has arrested development in MOUAU because of the dictatorial tendencies of the Council Chairman, Comrade Fidelis Edeh.
