UNILAG: Sexual harassment allegation against professor unsubstantiated | EduCeleb
Abdussalam Amoo
16th July 2018
The management of the University of Lagos (UNILAG) has declared that the allegation against one of its professors remains unsubstantiated. It attributed this largely to the unfruitful attempts to reach the accuser whom it also challenged to come forward to present her side of the story.
Recall that in May, some nude pictures of the professor, Olusegun Awonusi were published on Linda Ikeji’s Blog where a supposedly female student was said to have accused the English lecturer of sexually molesting her and other female students in the Department of English.
Following that, the UNILAG management set up a Fact Finding Panel to investigate the allegations leveled against Awonusi, a former Vice Chancellor at Tai Solarin University of Education, Ijagun and education commissioner in Ogun State.
The UNILAG spokesperson, Taiwo Oloyede revealed on Monday that the outcome of the findings by the Panel investigating the controversy “indicate that the allegation of sexual harassment was not substantiated by the alleged victim or any other person.”
EduCeleb.com identified the lady as Joy Nwanna who was no longer a student as at the time of the accusation as she had graduated three years earlier. When we sought information from Professor Awonusi, he alleged that the pictures online were a failed attempt to blackmail him.
Ms Oloyede further confirmed that Nwanna was a student under Awonusi in the university at some time in the past while appealing for her appearance before the Panel to state her side of the story.  According to her, entreaties towards having Linda Ikeji persuade Nwanna to come forward also failed.
In her words, “Student records of Miss Joy Nwanna reveal that she was admitted into the Department of English as a direct entry student in the 2012/2013 session. She graduated from the University in 2015/2016 academic session.”
“All attempts made by the Fact Finding Panel to contact Miss Nwanna by the telephone numbers in her student records and by e-mail proved abortive. The Panel also attempted to contact Linda Ikeji to convince the alleged victim to come forward but Linda Ikeji was not forthcoming in that regard.”
“The University assures both Miss Joy Nwanna and Linda ikeji of necessary protection should they decide to come forward.”
She added that investigations were still ongoing to answer some questions raised in connection to the scandal while promising the general public of its decisiveness to get to the root of the matter.
“In the interim, the University will continue with its investigations and will leave no stone unturned in getting to the root of this matter.”