.Calls for inclusion of retired Registrar, Bursar
….Alleges unfair treatment against Babalakin
By Johnbosco Agbakwuru
THE Senior Staff Association of Nigerian Universities, SSANU, Monday faulted the composition of Special Visitation Panel on the University of Lagos Vice Chancellors crisis by the Visitor of the University, President Muhammadu Buhari.

President Buhari, who is the visitor of the University had directed the setting up of a special Visitation Panel and also ordered for a special Senate meeting.

But SSANU in a letter to the President, which was copied to the Minister of Education and the Executive Secretary, National Universities Commission, NUC, expressed worry about the composition of the Special Visitation Panel which is dominated by Professors who are members of the Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU, alleging that it was an indication that the decisions of the Panel would be tampered with by ASUU.

SSANU in the letter signed by its President, Comrade Samson Chijioke Ugwoke, argued that for the fact that some Professors in the panel are former Vice- Chancellors also meant that they would protect one of their own, the embattled Vice-Chancellor that was removed by Dr. Wale Babalakin.

It therefore called for a fair and unbiased Panel, representative of all stakeholders in the University system which should include at least a retired Registrar, a retired Bursar, and a prominent individual with undoubted integrity, who should be a former Pro-Chancellor and not a Professor, as Chairman of the Panel.

It said with the present composition and membership of the Panel, the Federal Government may have unwittingly handed over the Panel to ASUU to return victory to its member and condemn all others.

SSANU called for a re-composition of the Panel to reflect neutrality, fairness and proper representation and not using ASUU to probe itself as the situation currently is, adding that the principle of natural justice is lost in the present composition of the Visitation Panel.