ASUU disqualifies Pantami as professor, says academic promotion illegal

The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) on Monday disqualified the Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, Dr. Isa Ali Pantami, as a professor in the Nigerian academic system. The Union nullified the professorship awarded the minister, declaring the promotion   illegal.

The President of ASUU, Prof. Emmanuel Osodeke, at a media conference at the end of its National Executive Council meeting on Monday, declared: “You cannot be a minister and a lecturer in a university. It is an encouragement of illegality.

“Pantami has to quit as a minister and be tried for doing double jobs within the same federal system. He is not qualified. Pantami should not be treated as a professor.”

ASUU disclosed that the Union will sanction its members involved in the promotion, including the Vice Chancellor of the Federal University of Technology, Owerri (FUTO), Imo State, for the illegal promotion.

According to Prof. Emmanuel Osodeke, “We have resolved to sanction ASUU members involved in his promotion and the VC of FUTO.”

The Council of the Federal University of Technology, Owerri, had promoted Pantami, and seven other academics in September 2021 to professors at the Council’s 186th meeting. Controversies had trailed the promotion since 2021.