The University of Ibadan management has sacked Chukwuemeka Diji, the lecturer who protested the ‘illegal’ deduction of his salaries, since September 2018.
Mr Diji, a PhD holder, acted as the Head of the Department of Mechanical Engineering from September 2015 to July 2017 before a substantial head was appointed.
However, it was gathered that the decision to terminate Mr Diji’s appointment was announced by the university’s Senior Staff Disciplinary Committee (SSDC) on July 8.
Investigation and documents revealed that Mr Diji complained about various controversial, financial actions by his predecessor, Ademola Dare, and successor, Leke Oluwole.
He also questioned the deductions from his salary, saying they were illegal.
Mr Diji claims his ordeal may be as a result of the infractions of his predecessor which he reportedly exposed during his (Diji’s) tenure.
One of these is the running of a bank account for Energy, Technology and Management (ETM) conference for the department of mechanical engineering.
In 2018, Mr Diji wrote the Independent Corrupt Practices and other related offences Commission (ICPC), demanding an investigation into the ‘corrupt practices’ in the department.
He also alleged that he was being victimised for revealing some of the shady activities.
He begged the commission to compel the university to probe the organisation of the ETM conference and its account since 2012- 2016.
Reacting to the accusations, Mr Oluwole said the account was opened before the implementation of the Treasury Single Account (TSA) policy.
TSA policy forbids any government parastatal from running a separate bank account. It was implemented in 2015 but was extended in some universities for a while longer.
