TEMPO, July 18, 2002: He is alleged by some on the campus as a man who has a voracious appetite for sex. Some even believe that he has "a Satanic, uncontrollable desire to savour anything in skirt". One angry source who spoke to TEMPO in Uyo last week even described him as "someone with a seeming gluttonous libido".
These descriptions may be right or wrong. But they are the kinds of unalluring aura of depiction which now surrounds the personality of Dr. Uwemedimo Atakpo, father of four and senior lecturer in the Theatre Arts Department of the University of Uyo. In fact, words are widespread on the campus that Atakpo is "one of the most reckless womanizers among lecturers in the university". One official document at the disposal of this magazine paints the lecturer as a lecher who must purge himself of his lecherous ways if he is to maintain his integrity as a lecturer in the university system.
But, how did Dr. Atakpo amass these bagfuls of negative qualifiers? TEMPO gathered that Atakpo's amorous escapades in the university first came to the knowledge of the administrators of the institution in late 1997 when some frustrated students of his department petitioned the Vice-Chancellor, complaining of being sexually harassed by the lecturer. Shocked and saddened by the highly indicting petitions, the then Vice-Chancellor of the university, Prof. Fola Lasisi, set up a panel in September 1997 to investigate the allegations.
The panel, headed by one Professor I. I. Ukpong, was told by Grace Antia, then a year three student of Theatre Arts, that Atakpo, apart from demanding money for the award of marks, was in the habit of asking female students out for sex. She declared that she, together with three other colleagues, was dying under the weight of the lecturer's unceasing sexual advances.
Another witness, Felicia Etim Isemin, stormed the panel with stunning revelations. Isemin told the panel that Atakpo appeared bent on stalling her graduation from the university because of her rejection of his sexual overtures. According to her, when she could not meet the lecturer's persistent sexual demands, Atakpo made a monetary demand of N2,000 in lieu of sex. Even in the examination hall, Isemin said, Atakpo would come and whisper to her his demand for sex or money in order to pass the examination. When she refused to succumb to the satanic demands, Atakpo failed her in his course. Isemin also revealed that shortly after the panel was constituted, the randy lecturer, as some prefer to refer to Atakpo, started visiting her home and mounting pressures on her relatives to compel her to withdraw her petition, a plea she said she resisted.
As if Isemin's submissions were not damning enough, another witness, Nsisong Obot, dazed the panel with hypnotic revelations. Obot said Atakpo had continued to shun her project's file, submitted to him six months earlier, just because she did not honour a sex appointment which the lecturer had scheduled for Diamond Lodge in Uyo. The panel members were stunned and wanted to test the truthfulness of Obot's evidence. So, they invited Atakpo for cross-examination while Obot was still giving her testimony, an action the panel said it took "because it felt that if Obot was lying against her lecturer, she would not be bold enough to face him squarely with the allegations". But she did, and of course, Atakpo denied. The panel, however, believed that Atakpo was merely being economical with the truth as "this was a case of delaying tactics by Mr. Atakpo, using the project as a bait".
Evidence also came the way of the panel from one Chief Christian Amuzie who wrote from outside the university to complain that Atakpo was sexually assaulting his wife, who was a student of the department. Amuzie pleaded with the university to prevail on Atakpo to leave his wife alone.
In the face of the heap of evidence, the panel declared that, "There is abundant evidence to support these allegations of sexual harassments against Atakpo." "Atakpo," the panel noted, "is not the only male lecturer in the Theatre Arts Department.
“Therefore, for these fingers to point at one particular lecturer shows that there is a propensity or weakness in him which he must purge if he is to maintain his integrity as a lecturer in the university system." After its counsel to Atakpo that as a married man with four children, he should exercise a good degree of responsibility in his sexual life, the panel recommended that Atakpo be suspended from duty and his case referred to the University's Senior Staff Disciplinary Committee for final determination.
Following these recommendations, Atakpo was suspended from duty in July 1998. In a letter addressed to him and signed by the then Registrar of the university, Jacob Aborisade, the university said it had considered the report of the panel and noted that based on the weight of evidence, it was placing Atakpo on half pay and suspending him from duties. He was also ordered to submit all university property in his possession and barred the campus until the final determination of his case.
But in a dramatic twist, which smells of high power play and official cover-up, and contrary to the expectation of some staff and students of the university, Atakpo was reinstated one month later.
Staff and students who were already celebrating "the good riddance to bad rubbish" that Atakpo's suspension was, were shocked to their marrows. In another letter to Atakpo in August 1998, the university informed him that they believed the Appointments and Promotions Committee of the university had considered his case and was unable to accept his total denial of all the acts of misconduct levelled against him by his students. The committee considered the lecturer's conduct as unethical and unprofessional, which is unbecoming of an academic staff.
But the same letter that described Atakpo's conduct as "unethical and dishonest" is ironically the same vehicle through which he was reinstated. All that Atakpo got for his gross misconduct was, "You are hereby strongly warned." To the consternation of some staff who spoke to TEMPO in Uyo last week, the half of Atakpo's salary withheld as a result of his suspension was paid. So, he suffered no cost at all for his misbehaviour. If anything, he gained, since he was fully paid for the period he was on suspension and did not render any service to the university.
TEMPO gathered that the shudders that went through some staff of the university as a result of the "levity" with which the case was treated has yet to completely evaporate. One lecturer, who is close to Atakpo, told TEMPO at the annex campus of the university that the case was one of the greatest hypocrisies he had witnessed in UNIUYO.
Atakpo, rather than being repentant, is alleged to have continued to swim in dirty waters. After a 2-year hiatus, Atakpo bounced back to infamy last year. At a meeting in July 2001, the Governing Council of the university received and considered a report of the Senior Staff Disciplinary Committee which has been investigating Atakpo over a fresh allegation of "knowingly and deliberately altering the examination results of THA 245 (fundamentals of playwriting)".
In September 2001, the Governing Council, through the university Registrar, Peter Efiong, reminded Atakpo of his earlier case of sexual harassment and extortion and expressed irritation over his new case of falsification of examination results. Consequently, Atakpo's appointment with the university was terminated.
But seven months after, Atakpo has bounced back yet again to the university. Like a cat with nine lives, the lecturer has again been reinstated; giving room for speculation in the university that Atakpo may be a sacred cow, one that is above the laws of the university. TEMPO was told that Atakpo is well connected and enjoys the support of some top officials of the university.
Atakpo was absent when this magazine visited his office at the annex campus of the university twice last week but some of his colleagues confided in the reporter that they too were shocked that Atakpo, who had demonstrated fully that "he is not worthy in character" was reinstated. " Did Dr. Uwemedimo Atakpo knowingly and deliberately alter THA 245 examination results? And, was that the first time he was investigated, found guilty and punished for such an offence in this university? Is he so indispensable to the system that unprecedented exceptions must be made to the rules, always, to accommodate him?," asked Dr. Inih Ebong, an associate professor of Theatre Arts, in a petition he sent to the Governing Council of the institution in respect of Atakpo's reinstatement.
But one close associate of Professor Akpan Ekpo, Vice-Chancellor of the university, who pleaded that his name be omitted, explained to TEMPO that Atakpo was not "just arbitrarily recalled". "Everything in the university system has its procedure. If a man is dismissed and the university later realised that its earlier decision can be reversed, there is nothing bad in that. Atakpo was investigated and sacked. A group of highly intelligent academics were later constituted to consider his appeal. And the group says he should be conditionally reabsorbed. There is no double standard in that," he explained.
That certainly does not sound like music to the ears of many in the university. Some said it was curious that it was the same Senior Staff Disciplinary Committee which indicted Atakpo and recommended that he be sacked that made representation to the Governing Council that he be reinstated. "On what grounds is this playboy of a lecturer recalled? What further evidence do the university need to know that Atakpo does not belong here or are they waiting for him to impregnate all the female students?," asked Emmanuel Etuk, who claimed to be a student in the Faculty of Arts in the university. And Inih Ebong, an associate professor, wonders what the public and the presidency would think about this university if they learnt that lecturers who extort money from students and sexually harassed female students to alter results in their favour are always insulated from punishment; condoned and protected by the administration while students who cheat in examinations are summarily rusticated from the university by the same administration.
Sentiments like these run very deep on the campus when TEMPO visited last week. Professor Ekpo's spokesman said that most of the allegations were exaggerated.
May be. But one thing stood out. The Vice-Chancellor's radical steps to cleanse his university, which all along had enjoyed tremendous goodwill, are now being viewed with doubt and suspicion by many. One other thing that stood out clearly is that Atakpo is back and the girls in his department are fretting.
Editor's Note: A student from the University of Uyo sent In this story( story appeared in the defunt Tempo Magazine in 2002) after the publication of The Ambrose Alli University Video, the source wrote to us to say that the Professor mentioned in the story Is "Still In Service."
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