Controversial Credentials: My employment file may have been tampered with, suspended Nigerian Professor alleges
The suspended Professor of the Federal University of Agriculture (FUNNAB) Abeokuta over allegation of inconsistencies in his age and names on documents he submitted to the institution for employment has also alleged that, he suspected foul play against him.
Penpushing reports that, the embattled university lecturer, Prof AbdulAkeem Agboola in response to the allegations and a letter written to him by the university authorities asking him to provide his credentials said he found such request embarrassing.
The Professor of Mathematics said he suspected that some faceless people in the university registry may have tampered with his personal and employment files, arguing that, he had earlier participated in two staff auditing exercises, where his original credentials were shown to the panels.
‘I hope someone somewhere is not tampering and playing foul with my personal file in the registry. Apart from my Ph.D certificate which was submitted in 2002, all my other credentials were submitted in 1994 and they have since been inside my personal file in the department, college, and registry without any complaints from the registry, Agboola explained
Penpushing further reports that, the university, however, denied the allegation, stressing that Agboola submitted a ‘To Whom It May Concern’ letter as evidence for completion of his M.Sc when he was offered appointment as Assistant Lecturer in 1994
“In any way, a quick review of the credentials submitted have shown various inconsistencies in the names on them, right from your birth certificate, through your Doctoral Degree certificate’, the university declared.
“Consequently, there is immediate need for you to explain these inconsistencies as it cannot be safely said that various names on different certificate belong to the same person.It also observed that the date on the birth certificate is not in tandem with the 60th birthday celebration you recently had in public space”, the management wrote Agboola
Penpushing also reports that, the Public Relations Officer of the university, Kola Adepoju when contacted explained that the university some weeks ago got wind of the issue of age falsification and promptly set up a panel to look into it and take appropriate punitive measure in line with the university internal regulatory mechanism.
‘Our university hasn’t issued any statement on this issue because we have since done the needful and that is already in the domain of the public, which the media in their separate reports in the last two days alluded to’, Adepoju wrote.
‘Suffice to educate you that our university as expected of any statutorily established tertiary institution is not a loosed entity but a sane community where there are established ethos, norms and checks guiding, guarding and regulating the conduct of any member or group of people in the clime’, he added.
‘This, the university management, following the painstaking investigations, findings and the attendant recommendations of the panel aforementioned, invoked without compromising standard by suspending the Professor’, Adepoju added.
‘That was some weeks ago and ever since it’s been in the public media and the media outfits which freshly feasted on it in the last three days lend credence to this fact by alluding to it in their reports that we have since suspended the Professor’, he stated.
Penpushing further reports that, the embattled lecturer joined the university in 1994 with letter of ‘To Whom It May Concern’ used to authenticate his MSc certificate, and thereafter used same for his Ph.D.programme
The problem of the Professor was traced to his 58th birthday celebrated in 2016,and thereafter was reported to have marked his 60th birthday in 2020, while credentials submitted to the university indicated that he was born in 1965, which indicates that he was 56 years old as of 2021.
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