The University of Nigeria Nsukka Aluminum Association (UNAA) has called on President Bola Tinubu to declare a state of emergency on the nation's dwindling economy.
The call was contained in a communique raised at the end of the association's 110th National Executive Council (NEC) Meeting, held recently at the Nigerian Institution of Surveyors' Secretariat, Imo State, where various issues of national interests were extensively discussed.
The communique, signed by Queen Dr. Linda Agua-Onyekwelu and Mr. Tony Chukwu, UNAA National President and National Secretary, respectively, was made available to newsmen in Nsukka at the weekend.
The association urged the federal government to declare a state of emergency on the Nigerian economy, develop and implement a national Economic strategy and action plan, as well as assemble the country's best brains to urgently turn around the nation's economy.
"UNAA NEC called on the Federal Government of Nigeria to declare a state of emergency on the Nigerian economy and assemble the best brains that Nigeria can muster both locally and in the diaspora to execute a well-designed, fit-for-purpose marshall plan to urgently pull the economy out of the trauma it has found itself.
"At the 110th NEC Meeting of UNAA, chaired by Mr. Frank Nneji, the Founder and Director of ABC Transport and Logistics company Plc, Prof Aloysius Okolie, the Vice Chancellor Enugu State University of Science and Technology (ESUT) delivered the Guest Lecture on the theme, "Sustaining the Dignity of Man in a Traumatized Economy," and described a traumatized economy as a depressed and depreciated economy characterized by hyper and galloping inflation, very high levels of unemployment and under-employment, very high levels of idle and abandoned assets, underutilization of variable human capital and capacities, very low levels of productivity and production, cost of living crisis, sovereign debt problems, falling currency values, fall in consumer confidence etc and suggests the following measures among others:
1. The Federal Government as the primus interpares in the face of Nigeria must urgently develop and implement a national Economic strategy and action plan which must galvanize the creative and productive energies of the public sector at all levels- Federal, States and Local Governments to pull Nigeria out of the prevailing economic quagmire.
2. The drivers of national economic strategy and action plan at all levels should employ SWOT (strength, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats) analysis to design effective solutions for all sectors of the economy to achieve the desired results.
3. Full completion and utilization of abandoned and idle physical assets to add value to the economy.
4. Building and utilizing a database of idle and under-performing Nigerian Human Capital both locally and in the diaspora.
5. Thinking both "inside and outside the box to find innovative ways of resuscitating the economy.
The association also encouraged the University authority to remedy the anomaly and mediate towards restoring peace within the Alumni Association, as the Peace Accord mediated earlier by preeminent elders of UNAA like Chief Emmanuel Iwuanyanwu, Chief Johnny Chukwu, Amb. Kema Chikwe, Rtd Police Comm. Alobi and many others were scorned and repudiated by the splinter group.
After considering the points by the guest speaker and other salient issues raised at the meeting, NEC resolved as follows;
1. The association decried the division and fractionalization of UNAA by the University Governing Council since the 103rd NEC Meeting/25 Biennial Convention of November 2019 at Nnewi, Anambra State, and constituted a five-member committee of former and serving Vice Chancellors that graced the occasion to engage the University management and newly constituted Governing Council to find a lasting solution that will put an end to the matter. The committee is to be cheered by the former Vice Chancellor of Imo State University and an eminent and distinguished alumnus Prof. U. A. Awuzie.
2. NEC commended the National President Queen Dr. Mrs. Linda Agua-Onyekwelu, for her peaceful disposition in the face of the protracted crisis, the quality of her leadership style, her spirit of unity and reconciliation, and thereby passed a vote of confidence on her.
3. They also condemned the penchant, manipulative take-over, and imposition of leadership on alumni associations in some tertiary institutions in Nigeria by their University Management as is the case in UNN. The grave administrative corruption and lack of capacity of some past Vice Chancellors has stunned the growth and development of the institution, especially in the provision of infrastructure and other amenities which these Alumni associations have enormous capacity to deliver if there is good governance and therefore expressed confidence in the ongoing transparent process that brought in the current Acting Vice Chancellor and wished him a successful tenure.
4. UNAA observed the restoration of peace to Imo State and urged the governor, Senator Hope Uzodinma to keep it up.
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