Johnkennedy Uzoma | Owerri
IN a bid to encourage academic excellence and scholarship among the students in the state, Governor Mr Hope Uzodimma, has announced a back-dated automatic employment for all the best graduating students of the Imo State University at the eighth convocation ceremony of the Imo State University, Owerri.
The governor who made the disclosure said this would be covering the period culminating in the 8th convocation ceremony as well as for the best graduating student of the university each year going forward.
He also announced to the admiration of the management and staff his administration’s intention to pay by March ending, 2023, the “salary of February 2020, which was a result of the mismanagement of the previous administration of the university.”
According to him “there is no limit to what a society can achieve through a properly structured and result-oriented educational programme.”
“Imo State government under my watch considers education as a fundamental investment in our drive towards development. This administration would do all that is necessary to help Imo State University to fulfil its noble expectation of rising to the challenge of assuming greater responsibility to move the state forward,” he said.
While explaining why his administration set up the Professor Chinedu Nebo visitation panel to carry out far reaching investigations into the state of the university prior to his assuming office in 2020, he noted that the institution is now on the part of reckoning for academic competitiveness, scholarship and lofty achievements.
He lauded the efforts of the new management of the university headed by Professor Chukwumaeze, asking it to key into his dream and that of the founding fathers of the institution to make it a destination of choice for academic research, ideas generation and knowledge creation.
He promised that his administration would continue to support the university to realise its set objectives.
He also tasked the graduands to pursue everything noble, shunning crimes and criminality wherever they exist.
In his remarks, the vice chancellor of the institution, Professor U.U Chukwumaeze, disclosed that out of the 5000 graduating students, a total of 30 bagged first class honours degree in various disciplines.
Describing the graduands as among the best in the world as their predecessors have demonstrated, the VC charged them to bear in mind the full implications of the school motto: ‘Excellence in Service.’
The VC thanked the visitor, Governor Hope Uzodimma for all the support his administration had extended to the university.
“Your abiding interest in the affairs of the university; generous funding of its projects even in the face and defiance of the downturn in the world economy, regular payment of salaries and many other sundry gestures aimed at transforming Imo State University to a world class university are dearly appreciated,” he said.
