FROM IKHILI EBALU, BENIN CITY
Immediate past Acting Vice Chancellor, Ambrose Alli University, AAU, Ekpoma, Professor Sonnie Adagbonyin has reacted to claims that his management received directives from former Governor Godwin Obaseki, to reinstate the two staff disengaged by the defunct Special Intervention Team, SIT, but did not implement them.
Professor Adagbonyin made the rebuttal on Friday while responding to a publication by an online blog, Spark News Naija, titled ‘Reinstatement of Sacked Lecturers: Governor Okpebholo’s Stance is Unassailable,’ credited to Nosa Ekhator.
In the said report, Ekhator quoted the Principal Assistant Registrar and Head of Information, Public Relations and Protocol, AAU, Otunba Mike Aladenika, as saying that the directive to reinstate the two lecturers who were disengaged by the SIT during Obaseki’s tenure was issued to the university management by the former governor, but was not implemented due to lack of political will.
Adagbonyin stated that while he would choose to reserve his comments on the many issues surrounding the SIT’s disengagement of the two staff, it would however be proper to correct the wrong impression that their fate was in the hands of the university management.
He asserted that notwithstanding this, he was unaware of any directive issued to his management by the governor or the SIT beyond the release made on social media and the pages of newspapers by the former governor’s Special Adviser on Media Projects, Mr Crusoe which condemned the action of the SIT at the time.
Adagbonyin said he would be interested in seeing the memo either from the governor or the SIT that directed his management to recall the sacked staff. He said he was also keen on seeing someone come forward with details of the sanctions his management received for their “lack of a political will” to carry out the governor’s directives, as it was impossible to flout a governor’s directives without sanctions.
“What is political will in the face of government’s directives? It is strange, very strange indeed! We are no longer in office, but we are sure that we have managed to keep a record of all that transpired when we were there. Certainly, government or the SIT issuing us directives to reinstate the two disengaged staff was not one of them,” the former vice chancellor said.
