‘No Comment’: Matter In Court, Says Pantami On ASUU’s Claim On Appointment As Professor

The Minister of Communication and Digital Economy, Ali Pantami, on Wednesday, declined to comment on the allegation by the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) challenging his appointment as a professor of Cybersecurity by the Federal University of Technology, Owerri (FUTO).

ASUU had on Monday declared that the professorship awarded to Pantami was ‘unprecedented and illegal.’

The union’s president, Emmanuel Osodeke, at a press conference had said the review of the processes that led to Pantami’s appointment as a professor of Cybersecurity by the Federal University of Technology, Owerri (FUTO), were against the laid-down procedures within the university system.

Osodeke had said: ‘ASUU NEC rejects in its entirety the purported appointment of Dr Isah Ali Ibrahim Pantami as a professor of cybersecurity.

‘From the evidence available to us, Dr Pantami was not qualified, and the said appointment violated established procedure for appointment of professors in the university.

‘NEC directs all members and branches of our union throughout the Nigerian federation not to recognise, accord or treat Dr Isah Ali Ibrahim Pantami as a professor of cybersecurity under any guise NEC.’

The university has also come under heavy criticism from Nigerians, especially scholars and activists, who described the minister’s appointment as patronising and ‘an assault on Nigeria’s academic system.’

Asked to react to the development at the end of the Federal Executive Council (FEC) presided over by Vice President Yemi Osinbajo in the State House, Abuja, Pantami replied ‘no comment’.

He resisted several attempts by the newsmen to get him to react to the development, noting that the matter was already in court.

In September 2021, Pantami was among seven academics who were elevated by the council of FUTO to the position of a professorship at the council’s 186th meeting.

The university, in a statement, listed others to include Lawrence Ettu as a professor of civil engineering; Godfrey Emeghara as a professor of maritime management technology; Okechukwu Onyelucheya as a professor of chemical engineering; Alex Opara and Chikwendu Okereke as professors of geology, among others.