The Vice Chancellor of Ebonyi State University (EBSU), Professor Chigozie Ogbu, Tuesday denied the rumour of his resignation.
News of prof. Ogbu resignation circulated all over the state and social media, but he however, said there was no such attempt.
Addressing journalists in his office at EBSU, the VC revealed the intention of the institution to reduce salaries of her staff.
He said, “We all woke up to the news like you heard, that the Vice Chancellor has resigned, but that is absolutely false in anyway, intended or unintended.
“So, the Vice Chancellor has not, has no intention to resign for any reason but let me explain to you what has led to this; you recall that either in February or March, all educational institutions were closed, the University included and you know the major source of income in the University are the students and at the time of the closure, students were just registering.
“A good number had registered, a good number have not registered either. So because of the fee collected, we were able to continue to pay salaries until the end of May and that time, we met with the staff, with the unions and everybody and explain to them our handicap because we don’t collect fees again, there is no other source of getting money to pay school fees, the state government subvents the salaries.
“They’ve been paying their own subvention but internally because we don’t have money from students, the University cannot make up to join portion of the salary. It was from June, we stopped paying salary and that’s where we are.
“Now, when the council became aware of this, we set up a committee to see what can be done to raise fund for the University. That committee worked with the union and other members of the Academia came up with the report which Thursday last week, was presented to the visitor to the University, the Governor of the state, Engr David Nweze Umahi.
“On Thursday, that presentation was done by the Chairman of the Council; in that meeting, it was obvious that the Governor who had been saying that all institutions must make sacrifice in terms of reducing their wage bill, instructed that the University must go back and look at itself critically and see how they can sacrifice to reduce the salary, then know what else to help with.
“You are aware that many institutions have reduced the salary of their staff, we should take our sister institution here in Ikwo, you know they have been receiving 85% off their salary since last year. And so they already thought that the University can make some sacrifice in terms of reducing their wage bill and then help in area they can. So, that’s what transpired.
“For the past two(2) days, we’ve been working on our activities to see where we can reduce to be able to satisfy him to enable him give us some assistance to continue to pay salary.
“There is nothing that necessitated anybody to think that the VC is resigning or is not happy because these are hard time for everybody, for the University and for other organizations and we all appreciate it and will do whatever we can to come out of it.
There is no resignation of anybody here in the University, let alone the VC” he said.
