National President of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), Dr Nasir Isa, has described as irresponsible, the withdrawal by the Lagos State University of the Ph.D awarded to ASUU chairman, Lagos State University (LASU) branch, Dr Adekunle Idris.
Dr Isa made this remark at LASU, on Monday, where he addressed a press conference over the matter.
According to him, “The withdrawal shows that the people in charge of the university do not know what they are doing. This is why we insist on respecting the provisions of the Universities Miscellaneous Act. Our union has decided to throw our weight behind LASU branch.”
The vice chancellor of the university, Professor John Oladapo Obafunwa, had said he was neither responsible for the award nor the withdrawal of the certificate, since it was normally the university senate that handles such matters.
He said the university, in 2004, approved three Ph.D programmes in Business Administration, Management, and International Business.
Obafunwa said Dr Adekunle Idris’s Ph.D was withdrawn because it bears ‘Ph.D Business Administration (Marketing)’, whereas ‘Marketing’ was never approved by the senate.
But on his part, Idris insisted that he was admitted for Ph.D Business Administration, saying “Marketing is a specialised field under Business Administration.”
He also said when the school decided to offer him a certificate that bears Ph.D Business Administration (Marketing), it was not in his place to protest, especially since such certificates had been awarded to some lecturers before him.
He mentioned Dr Mrs Scholastica Udegbe (current Marketing head of department), whose thesis was on Business Administration (Marketing).
Asked if some people (including the candidate’s supervisor and officials at the Postgraduate School) would not be held responsible for awarding a degree in a programme that was not recognised by the university senate, the vice chancellor said a committee had been set up to look into what happened in-house.
“Nothing is being swept under the carpet. If we must clean the house, so be it”, he said.
Idris, however, said his case would be handled by Femi Falana, as he displayed his certificate, which he said was still his property.
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