The Director of Agribusiness Incubation Centre, Michael Okpara University of Agriculture, Umudike (MOUAU), Dr Philips Nto, who has been fighting for the release of his promotion to the rank of Professor since 2021, has faulted the position of the local chapter of ASUU on the matter.
He said the position of ASUU that he was not qualified to be made a professor on account of the 2017 staff condition of service was based on ignorance, pettiness, and nepotism.
Dr Nto said that his leave of absence was based on the 2003 staff condition of service, which was renewed every year, and wondered whether the new law was made to apply retroactively to him alone.
Describing the local chapter of ASUU as a wicked and manipulative tool in the hands of the Pro-Chancellor, Comrade Fidelis Edeh, he accused them of being errand boys in an orchestrated vendetta against him by Edeh.
He wondered how the ASUU Chairman, who is an indigene of Enugu State, same as the Council Chairman, would be more knowledgeable than the university’s lawyer, who had given his legal opinion that the 2017 condition of service cannot apply retroactively to his case.
Dr Nto, a former Commissioner for Finance and Economic Planning in Abia State, also addressed the accusation that he wants to jump from the position of a senior lecturer to professor without first being promoted to the rank of an associate professor.
According to him, contrary to their submission, he was assessed both as an associate professor and as a professor, after which the files were submitted separately.
He said such a practice was not alien in the university system and that the Council was expected to attend to them separately on their merits.
He said it was rather baffling that after sitting 10 consecutive times, the council could not reject or approve his promotion, which is the reason he decided to appeal to President Bola Ahmed Tinubu for his intervention since all internal mechanisms are exhausted.
Dr Nto accused Edeh of a personal vendetta against him, so much so that after the Council’s committee recommended his promotion, the Chairman sat on it, citing all manner of excuses.
He said ASUU in MOUAU was composed of a cabal controlled by Enugu indigenes and has constituted itself into a stumbling block against the progress of academic staff in the institution.
“Imagine, in a federal university, the current and immediate past chairpersons of ASUU MOUAU are from Enugu State.”
According to him, it was because of such insensitivity to the welfare of staff and members that he withdrew his membership of the union on August 4, 2025. “Thus, I am not surprised with the fight back.”
He submitted that the local chapter of ASUU should stop the dissipation of energy in witch-hunting members and instead support the new National President of ASUU, who has achieved in two months what they could not achieve in eight years.
Dr Philips Nto called on the national leadership to investigate what he described as an unholy alliance between the local chapter and Edeh.
He accused ASUU MOUAU of bias by being particular about his case out of envy and challenged the executive to an open debate on why he should not be promoted to the rank of professor with effect from 2021.
He said those arguing blindly that he ought not to have been engaged in academic activities while on leave of absence should also be prepared to cancel the accreditation and certificates of those he supervised and taught during the period.
He reiterated his call for the Governing Council Chairman to either approve or reject his promotion with clearly stated reasons.
