The management of Osun State University has reiterated that the just concluded virtual matriculation which is the first of its kind in the history of Nigerian University system was a huge success. This was coming after the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) described the ceremony as a scam.
According to the Ibadan Zonal Coordinator of ASUU, Ade Adejumo, the Vice-Chancellor, Osun State University, Labode Popoola, was aiming to use the matriculation to get financial favour from the federal government. He stated that the University had succeeded in exposing the hapless students whose parents are experiencing non-payment of salaries, amputated salaries, disengagement and rightsizing due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic ravaging the world to be exploited by cyber cafe operators. as UNIOSUN cannot compete effectively as it lacks the infrastructure to execute e-learning delivery.
In response to this, UNIOSUN in a press release signed by the University’s Public Relations Officer, of the University, Ademola Adesoji, the Osun state-owned University said all the requirements of a matriculation ceremony were met in the virtual matriculation ceremony that was conducted and the University had 99% of the matriculating students connected and participated in the matriculating exercise.
The statement reads: "The management of Osun State University hereby states that the virtual matriculation which is the first of its kind in the history of Nigerian University system was a huge success. One of ASUU’s zonal coordinators' statement has no valid fact and evidence so we consider it as baseless, which ordinarily should be ignored.
"May we enlighten the said spokesperson of ASUU that our students do not need to go to cybercafé to attend a virtual matriculation ceremony. All they did was just to connect with their phones, tablets or personal computers in their various locations.
"All our students, including the fresh students have been using the same applications and devices that were used for the virtual matriculating ceremony for learning before the matriculating ceremony, hence they are familiar with them. As a matter of fact, one of the matriculating students, Kaothar Oyeyemi who spoke with Journalists online on that day said, she was very happy with the online matriculation as she said it saved them a lot of stress and time.
"If the students and staff of the University find the virtual matriculating ceremony as a success and a welcome development, we see no reason why ASUU which is expected to take the lead in this new normal should be calling it a scam.
"Stating that UNIOSUN cannot compete effectively as it lacks the infrastructure to execute e-learning delivery is also laughable. We at UNIOSUN had started executing e-learning even before the advent of COVID-19. We have trained all our academic staff on e-learning and with the support of our ICT team, we were able to deliver and execute e-learning effectively.
"We like to place it on record that the University is not a federal government-owned University that it will be doing "everything possible to seek the attention of the federal government". The University is a state University and the state Governor is aware of the new development. It will be recalled that the Vice-Chancellor, professor Labode Popoola wrote an article that was published in some national dailies on the need to embrace the new world order or else we sink."
We hereby advise the said ASUU zonal coordinator and his co-travellers to also use this period as an opportunity to build their capacities in online teaching and other activities, as the world as we knew it before COVID 19 is gone and gone forever. The possibilities are limitless and it is only for us to explore. Our Vice-Chancellor has been counselling that the new world order will demand a shift in mindset, taking ownership, readiness for stewardship, and accountability. The challenges will always be there and may also be daunting, but we should always remember that our calling teaches us to be undaunted. We sympathize with the ASUU zonal coordinator for exposing his own limitations.
