Three unions of the Forestry Research Institute of Nigeria (FRIN) held a protest in Ibadan, the Oyo State capital, on Monday demanding the removal of the institute’s Director-General (DG), Prof. Zachariah Yaduma.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the gates that lead to the institute and the Federal College of Forestry, Ibadan were locked.
Japhel Omolaiye, Chairman, Senior Staff Association of Universities, Teaching Hospitals, Research Institutions and Allied Institutions (SSAUTHRIAI), FRIN, said the peaceful protest was to show their grievance.
According to him, since the administration of the current DG, two years ago, the institute has been a shadow of itself, with no research activity taking place.
Omolaiye alleged that the DG had been abusing research professors, denigrating the Act that set up the institute and brought him in.
He said: “He is saying that they are faceless and disgruntled, questioning how our Act came about.
“It was an act established in 2018 by the Honourable House, and the then Senator Oluremi Tinubu as the Chairman of the Senate Committee on Environment.
“She used all her power, strength, and effort to get this Act instituted.
“And then for someone, because he’s from the university, to say that our research professors do not have the right to be research professors – the right given to them in the act, to say that this act is self-aggrandisement of someone, we will not accept that.
“This is why we have come out and said for such a person to denigrate and desecrate our institute and our act, he is not supposed to be here.”
Omolaiye stated that all the unions had employed dialogue and petition to get the DG to make the institute work, but nothing had worked.
He added: “We have given them one week to sort out whatever.
“We want him to leave the institute.
“That’s the major thing we’re asking for.”
Nathaniel Hasstrup, Secretary, Academic Staff Union of Research Institution (ASURI), said there had been no electricity supply and research activities since the appointment of the DG.
Hasstrup said: “I’m a Principal Research Officer in FRIN, Level 13, and honestly, as it stands for the past two years, we’ve not had any research funds.
“No research activity is going on, and we’re just there.
“We call this place Forestry Research Institute, but there is no research as it stands right now.
“For issues of training, we have to train and retrain.
“We have not experienced training for some years now.
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“As researchers, we need to upgrade ourselves, but we’ve not been having support in any way.”
Hasstrup called on the government and relevant stakeholders to intervene and set things right for the institute.
He said the DG must be replaced with someone who understands the institute’s mandates.
The Chairperson, Non-Academic Staff Union (NASU), Rebecca Adetona, said non-academic staff would be redundant without research activities in the institute.
Adetona said the welfare of staff such as water and electricity supply had not been adequately provided for.
“We use the bush as our convenience, leaving some of our people injured,” she said.
The NASU chairperson said the lack of good leadership had been the bane of development in the institute.
She added: “Now, we are to conduct another promotion, but the first people who did their promotion have yet to be paid their promotional arrears, yet they want to do another one.
“How is he going to do those things?
“Unions have been doing a lot for him, and he’s still calling us all sorts.
“Please, we want the government to intervene.”
Meanwhile, the institute’s media head, Nike Ogunbiyi, told NAN she was not in a position to give any information about the protest.
“I am not in the position to give you any information,” Ogunbiyi said.
NAN recalls that Yaduma became the 15th head of the 69-year-old institute in March 2023.
He is the second DG since FRIN got an enabling law in 2018.
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