Secretary of the University of Nigeria branch of Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU, Dr. Aaron Agbo, was Tuesday sacked by his colleagues after being accustomed of unauthorised negotiation with the university administration in the ongoing demonstrations for the recall of the pro-chancellor, Dr Emeka Enejere.
Agbo, who is in the Department of Psychology, had held the post for only a year before the sudden loss of it.
A panel headed by a senior academic, Professor Damian Opata, Head of Department of English, was also set up to determine further punishment to be meted out to the former ASUU scribe.
Members of the four unions in the university operating as Joint Action Committee, JAC, Monday resumed the demonstrations they suspended for Christmas and New Year break. However, Dr Agbo issued a notice instructing lecturers not to join the other four unions.
The chairman, Dr. Ifeanyi Abada, promptly countered the instruction in a different notice mobilising his colleagues.
Academic staff of all levels, therefore, joined the other three unions and marched round Nsukka campus on Monday but unknown to them, Dr Abada had gone to a meeting reportedly called by the Vice Chancellor, Professor Bartho Okolo, at Enugu campus in an attempt to negotiate with the staff.
The other unions, apart from ASUU, were National Association of Academic Technicians, NAAT; Non-Academic Staff Union, NASU, Enugu Campus; and Non-Academic Staff Union, NASU, Nsukka Campus.
Sources said workers at the Enugu Campus, however, resisted the attempt to negotiate with JAC in that meeting.
“Patrick Emeter, chairman of Non-Academic Staff Union (NASU, Enugu Campus) rose and told the VC that meetings of that nature were not convened verbally through telephone calls.
Ms. Rebecca Nnamani, ASUU’s Assistant Secretary, raised the objection that a meeting summoned to address the issues raised by four unions could not go on without proper representation of ASUU. The branch chairman was not invited and he was not in the meeting,” the source said.
According to the source, the VC was compelled to put off the meeting after appealing to workers to stop further demonstrations and come to the negotiating table.
The source also said the meeting was rescheduled for yesterday so that all parties would be properly represented.
Before the demonstration Tuesday, ASUU convened emergency congress at Nsukka campus and tabled the issue of Dr Agbo’s attempt to represent the union in the meeting with the VC without the branch chairman, Dr Abada.
