I have dismissed two lecturers over sexual harassment complaint – UNIZIK VC

Charles Esimone assumed office as the Vice Chancellor of Nnamdi Azikiwe University (UNIZIK), Awka, Anambra State in 2019. He has since taken the institution from 36th position to 4th while he insists on taking it to the number one position not only in Nigeria but Africa. In this interview with The Nation duo of Southeast Bureau Chief NWANOSIKE ONU and EMMA ELEKWA, the VC, whose tenure is billed to end in less than a year from now, lists the challenges, pains and gains of his tenure.

On assuming office in 2019, you vowed to make UNIZIK one of the best universities in Nigeria. The institution, which ranked 36th then, has since moved up to fourth. How did you manage to attain the feat?

It has not been easy because nationally and globally, we have been having a lot of challenges. And you know when the challenges come, they either hinder you from meeting expected targets or bring out the innovation in you, because your ability to surmount challenges is what makes you a vibrant, dynamic and successful leader.

As you rightly said, we came with a vision of what we tagged “Project 200” to make Nnamdi Azikiwe University one of the best 200 universities in the world and among the 10 best in Africa and number 1 in Nigeria. That vision is predicated upon five pillars which we summarized in the acronym for ACADA, A standing for Academic excellence, C for Community development, another A for Administrative reforms, D for Discipline and the last A for Advancement for whatever infrastructure that had been laid by my predecessors. As such, we are not expected to abandon any project or destroy any but to build on the foundation.

What were some of the challenges you encountered on assuming office?

We assumed office on June 4, 2019, and six months after, we were faced with COVID-19; a global pandemic that shut down virtually everything everywhere. That was a very major challenge because we couldn’t move or execute programmes and projects and, of course, that also came with attendant paucity of funds. No activity either from the federal government grants or local innovations we were trying to put in place.

After COVID-19, we witnessed the strike, followed by a little space of activity before another strike occurred. One of the strikes was general, including academic and non-academic staff. Even after the resumption, the recent removal of fuel subsidy and its attendant troubles, we are now grappling with all of these as the centre cannot hold.

Put together, we can identify two major challenges. One is funding. It drastically reduced, especially the sources. Insecurity followed, hindering activities seriously. Some of the major foreign partners we have, who made commitments in writing and words to assist us, are afraid to come. They can’t deploy their personnel and resources. Recently we had a very vibrant team from the US who managed to come for an international conference. But before now, they didn’t want to come. Even those from Germany we are discussing a project on energy with are afraid to come. They came and did some visibility studies early last year, but when insecurity increased, they disappeared. These are people that saw our vision and showed interest, but they all ran away.

Then, of course, is the challenge of economic meltdown, which also affected the students, who are major stakeholders. Some of them found it difficult to pay their fees and other levies, and you will blame neither them nor their parents. One of the things we have noticed is that when you have insecurity coupled with paucity of funds, you will never have a stable system, because even those who want to work with time frame to accomplish their activities will be frustrated.

Talking about paucity of funds, I recall your predecessors complained about non-receipt of N500 million take off grant. What is the situation with that?

We still have not received that. We’ve made a lot of efforts, but it is yet to come. So I have decided not to focus on that but to go through other means to source for funds. I must say that we have enjoyed certain level of federal government funding, but this is purely through personal relationships and manoeuvring here and there, including the National Assembly.

We have also had lots of special interventions from TetFUND. My relationship with members of the National Assembly has made them bring their personal projects. Directly or indirectly, I’ve compelled them, through goodwill, to invest in the university. At some point, it was as if they were competing on who would do the biggest project here.

I got a sitting House of Representatives member from Enugu to site his water regulation project in this place. But for the take off grant, we have not gotten any at the moment.

Apart from federal government and politicians, what are your other sources of funding for the institution?

Strictly by personal endowment; trying to reach out to well-meaning individuals to invest here. As we speak, we have reached out to Alhaji Abdulsamad Rabiu, the BUA group man. He is currently embarking on a N1 billion students’ centre. I was able to attract Alhaji Aliko Dangote who promised us two hostels. Unfortunately, he has not commenced. The last time I reached him, he gave assurances. There were some initial hicups. I like the man; a very simple person. He opened up to me that he did not want to build an elitist hostel. He wants a hostel that an average student can afford to pay for. He said those who live in elitist hostels don’t need his intervention, because they can pay for them. We were thinking he was coming to build self-contained, air-conditioned hotels. But he said no, he wanted the type of hostel he lived in as a student.

That mix-up prevented the project from kicking off for more than nine months, because we finished our designs and sent to him but didn’t hear from him until I met him face to face and he explained to me exactly what he wanted, and we decided to rework the plan with certain adjustments and sent back to him. Once he approves, work will commence.

Then, through Senator Ben Ndi Obi, we are building a Zik’s centre for research also. It is dedicated to the memories of Nnamdi Azikiwe himself. He got support from the Federal Inland Revenue Services (FIRS) which is funding it. Again, there is Chief Emeka Anyaoku’s Centre. Senator Linda Ikpeazu is also doing a maritime centre situated in Onitsha. Funding for that has been released, but there is a challenge which I must confess publicly. You attract a project and the common man is thinking government is paying us money for that. For the past one year, Senator Ikpeazu’s maritime project is yet to commence because the benefactor wanted it to be in Onitsha, close to the waterways.  We’ve got sites, done procurements and mobilised contractors to site, but Onitsha indigenes are frustrating the work, sueing government and us for their land. The Obi of Onitsha has done all he could, including mediatory moves, pleading with his people to see the need for the project, which their children will benefit from, yet they refused. As a result, we have changed the location three consecutive times and we are re currently in a dilemma.

Meanwhile, the cost of building materials keep skyrocketing, and the contractor is talking about variations. If we had envisaged this challenge, we would have pleaded it be situated in the university where we have land. This is a project that would have benefited not just the people of Onitsha or Anambra but the entire Southeast.

On her part, Senator Uche Ekwunife is building a skilll acquisition centre which is almost completed. Also remember, during the COVID-19 pandemic, through Senator Ifeanyi Ubah, we were able to get a wonderful and standard hospital, courtesy of Anambra Progressive Union. There is also another endowment by one young man from Adazi-ani (Chiko). He is doing a 500 seater auditorium for the Faculty of Social Sciences. I think they are almost at lintel level. Yet, there’s another young man from Enugu Ukwu (Onwa). He is doing an ICT for the Environmental Sciences faculty. That one is also at lintel level. All these are personal endowments.

At Nnewi, we had problem of accreditation because they didn’t have staff offices. So I got a young man, an alumnus of the school. He is doing office complex and classrooms for the Faculty of Medicine, which is also at lintel level. We really appreciate the man because he came at a time when the accreditation team insisted on such facilities before they would give approval. The man gave us December deadline assurances.

There are others who have started, including Igwe of Obosi who is doing a centre for Psychology.

We also have lots of endowments from TetFUND, including completed Faculty of Social Sciences building and Faculty of Education, Department of Vocational Education and Faculty of Pharmacy with two structures, all completed. We also used TetFUND special interventions to do the first molecular diagnostics laboratory, where we can analyse COVID-19 related issues. I don’t think we have such in the entire Southeast; well furnished and equipped.

We repeated another one in Agulu through PPP. We got a private investor who also did a state of the art. That one is yet to be commissioned, but it is already in use. We also have wonderful TetFUND lab, a urological centre at Neni, which is part of the campus but under-utilised. We have not started using it. Hopefully, before October ending, the place will be fully in use.

We also have a TetFUND center of excellence here for biomedical, engineering and agricultural translational research. Interest ingly, I was the one that wrote that £1.5b grant. Investors can take advantage of it. It is purely for training for Masters and PhD students. I sited it in Science Village deliberately to open up that area. We are also transforming part of the old medical centre to diagnostic centre. So altogether, we have three medical centres in the university with several consultants – pediatricians, gynecologists. So it can serve as a pseudo teaching hospital.

What about other forms of infrastructure, like roads?

In terms of roads, we also got some endowments. I even received a call from FERMA within the week, informing me that they have awarded another project, internal roads in Ifite Ogwari, which was previously in IGR budget which we don’t have. Before now, I got their approval to do the science village roads, which initially was impassable. There were no funds from the university on that. I only met the leadership. The one I’m focusing now is Nnewi-Okofia Road, which is in a bad state.

Meanwhile, many don’t know we have a primary school in Nnewi, Okofia Campus, bigger than the one here in Awka, which was also built through FGN capital intervention. That was in 2020. As we are touching the university, we are also touching the auxiliary primary school. We are also working on our Zoological gardens. The project is a marvelous one. The location was completely forest but we decided to convert it to a Zoo. Even though it is a work in progress, students are already going there for sight-seeing. The bigger animals we are trying to put in fortified enclosures, like lions and tigers, are ready, but I asked them not to bring them now. We’ll be bringing them little by little so they can grow gradually.

Students are also learning how to take care of the animals. We also have natural fish ponds. We already have monkeys while bamboos and chimpanzees will be brought in soon. We intend to make it conservation and tourist sites where actors and actresses can visit and get the history of various animals. While passing through the expressway, you will notice we have created a golf course. For the past two months now, I’ve been playing golf there. No support from the university. One of the secrets to all these is that we’re strengthening our business venture getting investors to drive

it.In a nutshell, in terms of infrastructure and human capital, we have worked a lot. We embarked on aggressive training. Even as a faculty Dean, I noticed that the greatest deficiency of most staff is inability to write grants. People were shy and afraid. So I started building them on grantsmanship gradually. As we speak, many are now writing grants because they see how easy it is to get even external grants. That is how a university should be. In the western world, lecturers are graded by how much money they are bringing from grants, not by what you are being paid.

The one I earlier said I wrote was meant for older university, but because of how short and articulate mine was, they dropped the one from UNN, sorry to say, but picked UNIZIK. I also got a grant during the COVID-19 outbreak. This is one of the soft skills we have been able to build in our staff, be it technologists or academic or administrative staff and even students. They go for training in batches. This I have also built in through the National Assembly. I believe in human capital development, because if human beings are not trained, whatever we’re doing will die.

We also did a wonderful innovation in Agriculture. Environment is a major aspect of any society. I partnered with National Conservation Forum (NCF) and we started embarking on aforestation. We’re doing conscious tree planting and we’re focusing on cash crops, funded by NCF, planting about 60,000 trees – melina, cashew nuts, among others. We are repeating same in Ifite Ogwari. We are also planning a mega farm in Ifite Ogwari (outside the one we currently have here) in partnership with some investors. We are about signing an MoU. We put all these in our master plan.

We also have plans to establish a microfinance bank. The site has been located, it remains funding. I am already discussing with those to fund it. The cooperative society will be part of the major stakeholders. I believe that in the next six months, we will have one.

Talking about A-C-A-D-A, how far have you gone with the aspect of discipline?

We’ve recorded a lot of progress in terms of discipline, which is a major part of my administration. There are two things involved in discipline. First is fairness, because if you are biased, it will be difficult to instill discipline. We have a great challenge here; many still operate in the old system where people are afraid of being accused of reporting evil. But if you don’t, it will be difficult to discipline the culprit. I tell them I don’t rely on gossip or do forensic investigation. If you see something, put it down and send to me. That is evidence. Once I see it, I take action because it is verifiable. Before now, examination misconduct took two years to tackle. But now, within a few weeks, we would have taken a decision. Besides, Senate is every month and no longer once a year as was obtainable in the past. Such cases are handled during Senate meetings. I know we still have a long way to go in terms of discipline.

Again, there are lots of people with phobia for ICT; those who don’t like changes. In everything we are doing, we’ve decided to make ICT the driving hub. For instance, our appraisals are now digital. For the first time, external appraisal that cost us lots of money and time is now digital. All our staff documents are uploaded electronically. The same applies to orientation. Before now, orientation for first year students was done manually. We gathered the students under the sun where they would be addressed by the VC and other authorities. Meanwhile, three quarters of them are busy leaking ice cream or chatting, without hearing what was being said. As such, the purpose of the orientation was defeated. Now, once you’ve gone through the clearance, you get

the link and log in online and go through the entire process, which is followed by questions to test whether you understood the lectures. If you fail, it will take you back to the module until you pass and you will be congratulated for another level of module.

All students are mandated to undergo the process, whether they like it or not. It is just seamless; all at their comfort and convenience. Within two or three weeks, you’re done, and you’ll receive a message, “Welcome to Nnamdi Azikiwe University” and you’ll be issued a registration number. This was introduced this

year. Virtually everything we are doing here, e-learning management system for large classes for regular students, sandwich and Continuous Education Programme, is digital. But we’re introducing them gradually and slowly. The results are there and many are calling me to appreciate us for the innovation.

There is also an app dedicated for students to appraise their lecturers. It is a short questionnaire filled anonymously. For now, we don’t intend to use it to punish the lecturers. But eventually, it will be used for their assessment.

We had earlier installed CCTV cameras in the entire university in terms of security. But we had the challenge of sabotage. Some were removed. But we are trying to reactivate them.

The good news is that we got an endowment from an alumnus of this institution, Onyedika, who is graciously donating 1,060 cameras to us. He has already installed about 50 of them in strategic areas, including lecture halls which will assist us detect exam malpractices. Lecturers are not using them, but we are talking with ICT officers to ensure they are all activated so we can have evidence.

Again, we intend to install the cameras in staff offices, but we are meeting oppositions. Some don’t want it, but I’m going to insist because of the several cases of sexual harassments here and there. The only way you can prove your innocence is to allow the camera in your office. This is one of the last things I’ll like to do. If they want to crucify me, so be it. But I will insist, because nobody has privacy in a public office. They can mount 20 in my office, I wouldn’t mind.

Have you been able to dismiss any member of staff over sexual harassments?

Yes, two of them: one from the Faculty of Law and the other from Pharmacy faculty. We don’t have many of them because of lack of evidence, because the students are afraid of reporting such cases. I have called the students’ union government executive and told them not to be afraid of intimidation when the lives and dignity of their members are in danger. That is why the cameras are needed. If only people will come up with verifiable evidence, those caught will be shown the exit door immediately.