Recently, members of the Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu University community supported by friends and associates of Professor Greg Nwakoby rolled out the drums to celebrate the first-ever Vice Chancellor’s Day of the institution. According to the organisers, the event marked the successful completion of five years in office by Professor Nwakoby as the fourth substantive Vice Chancellor of the institution having come into office in 2018.
Considering what was on ground when he assumed office and what he would leave behind as he completes his tenure, the era of Professor Nwakoby would at best be captured as the golden era in the 24-year history of the university.
It must be recalled that prior to the advent of Professor Nwakoby’s administration, the university contended with a myriad of seemingly intractable challenges that conspired to produce a hostile work place where destructive activism and rascal unionism held sway.
However, the coming on board of Professor Nwakoby as the Vice Chancellor of the university brought rays of hope to the institution. Without fanfare, Prof. Nwakoby hit the ground running to achieve what has been adjudged as a highly effective revolution. Thus, within few months in office, his administration conducted the most transparent staff audit exercise that liberated the university from the shackles of ghost workers and padded wage bills.
To shut out the leakages in the internally-generated revenue of the university, administration implemented the automated payment system which ultimately reduced revenue theft to the barest minimum and resolved the age-long discrepancies between bank records of collected school fees and portal records of registered students with zero-tolerance for manual cash transactions.
Consequently, the benefits of this new financial regime and ensuing prudent management of resources gave birth to a retinue of developmental projects, liquidation of all manner of bank loans accumulated by his predecessors in office, remittance of employee pensions and national housing fund that were deducted from staff salaries and equally cleared arrears of salaries owed genuine staff of the university. From then till now, the university has not faltered in the payment of monthly staff salaries and allowances.
Professor Nwakoby painstakingly overhauled the entire appointment of the university which has given birth to over two hundred academic staff on the professorial cadre as against only thirty-five that he met on assumption of office. In addition to non-discriminatory promotions, staff had a borderless access to the numerous staff training and development initiatives of the university including scholarships and conferences within Nigeria and overseas.
Through his Operation-No-Abandoned-Project scheme and redemption of the image of the school before TETFund, the Faculties of Engineering, Agriculture, Pharmaceutical Sciences buildings and University Medical Centre were all completed and put to effective use. Relieved from abandoned projects, the administration spearheaded the construction and completion of the Faculties of Arts, Social Sciences, Education, Health Sciences, and Basic Medical Sciences Buildings and extended blocks in the Pharmaceutical Sciences Complex. The construction of Faculty of Environmental Sciences and Architecture Building is ongoing while the proposed Faculty of Physical Sciences Building also received attention.
Through his vast human networks, Professor Nwakoby attracted the ANAN Resource Centre from the Association of National Accountants of Nigeria, new ICT Complex, Alex Onyido Pharmaceutical Complex, Insurance Building from National Insurance Commission, Intellectual Property and Technology Transfer Office from NOTAP, internal campus road projects by the Federal Roads Maintenance Agency and numerous hostel projects from individuals and organizations.
The University also enjoyed an enviable industrial harmony with the result that the academic calendar was never disrupted by any form of strike or student restiveness. In addition, almost all the academic programmes of the university currently have full accreditation status by the National Universities Commission (NUC) with many of the programmes winning awards at local and international fora. These and many more contributed to the NUC ranking the university as the Second Best State University in Nigeria.
As Professor Greg Nwakoby bows out of office as the Vice Chancellor of Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu University, it is pertinent to emphasize that a secured future for the University will be a future where the legacies of Professor Nwakoby are not just sustained but advanced and replicated with superlative zeal and positive energy.
To God be the glory.
Written by DR CHARLES EDOCHIE
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