There is an Ibibio proverb that warns with uncommon clarity: “nditọete emaeñwaana ke inie ete ammọ, isenowo esedʌñ ke ndoon ete ammọ”— when brothers fight over their father’s property, strangers will inherit it. No proverb could better capture the tragic farce that unfolded at the University of Uyo in recent months.
What should have been a dignified academic succession degenerated into a bruising spectacle of intrigue, sabotage, and naked ambition. Nearly ninety-eight percent of the contestants for the office of Vice Chancellor were professors of the University of Uyo. About ninety-nine percent were indigenes of Akwa Ibom State. This was, by every measure, a family affair. Yet, rather than rise to the moment with maturity and institutional loyalty, many chose the path of fratricide. It became a contest not of merit but of malice (an arena governed by the dangerous creed of if-not-me-it-must-not-be-anyone-else).
In this unholy scramble, lines were crossed with reckless abandon. Some professors (particularly those sponsored or anointed by the immediate past Vice Chancellor, Prof. Nyaudoh Ndaeyo) appeared more willing to destroy the image, academic integrity, and institutional stability of the University than to allow a credible and competent colleague emerge. The University itself became collateral damage in a war of egos.
Prof. Ndaeyo, for his part, seemed determined to outlive his tenure by proxy. He spared no effort in attempting to install a pliant successor from a retinue of wonky and timit loyalists. So intense was this desperation that, right up to his exit, the process for electing a substantive Vice Chancellor was deliberately stalled. In a last-minute maneuver, he hurriedly positioned his Deputy Vice Chancellor (Academics) (who was still a contestant in the race) as Acting Vice Chancellor. Predictably, this move collapsed under its own weight and could not stand beyond his final day in office on the 1st of December, 2025.
The Governing Council, perhaps seeking a temporary reprieve from the impasse, directed that the baton be handed to the Deputy Vice Chancellor (Administration), Prof. Aniekan Offiong, as a placeholder (himself also a contestant, and widely perceived as another extension of the same Ndaeyo camp). What followed only deepened the crisis. Prof. Offiong proved, regrettably, that an understudy can sometimes be worse than his master. All entreaties to allow the most senior professor on the University’s nominal roll assume the role of Acting Vice Chancellor — strictly to midwife a transparent and credible selection process — were rebuffed. Procedure was sacrificed on the altar of ambition.
After about three failed attempts by the Ndaeyo camp to impose a puppet on the system, the inevitable happened. The Federal Government, acting through the Federal Ministry of Education, intervened. A retired Professor, Adewunmi (a Yoruba man from Lagos State University) was appointed Acting Vice Chancellor of the University of Uyo.
Only then did the murmurs begin. In staff clubs, corridors, and offices, the very architects of this institutional self-sabotage began to whisper their indignation: Why a Yoruba man? Why not an Ibibio man? The question is not only disingenuous; it is profoundly insulting to logic and history. Having turned the University into a battleground, having rejected order, seniority, and merit, they now lament the arrival of a neutral umpire.
This is the height of hypocrisy. These are “mme ifọt ata idem”; people who chew pepper and blame their tongues. Visionless actors who set fire to their own house and cry when rain puts it out. If the brothers had not fought so viciously over their father’s inheritance, the stranger would never have been invited to preside over its rescue.
The lesson is stark and unavoidable. Institutions are not destroyed by outsiders; they are first weakened from within. The University of Uyo did not lose its moment because there were no qualified Ibibio professors. It lost it because too many chose ambition over conscience, intrigue over integrity, and ego over the common good. And so, the proverb has spoken again (ancient, patient, and unforgiving).
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Thomas Thomas writes from Tuskers Republic, Uyo.
