The University of Education (UEW), Ghana, has sacked a Nigerian professor, Augustine Nwagbara, over “unethical and damning” comments he made about the country and its education system.
Prof. Nwagbara had appeared in a viral video urging a group of people to employ the media from Nigeria to reshape the reportage of Nigerians based in Ghana.
Nwagbara said Nigerians were highly talented but lacked strategies to take advantage of their position, adding that the current government in Ghana rode to power “under Nigeria bashing.”
The professor of English Language said that the quality of education in Nigeria was better than that of Ghana, in condemnation of fees paid by Nigerian students in Ghana.
After the video went viral, Nwagbara was arrested by the Ghanaian police and accused of inciting the public.
He was later released on bail but asked to report to the police periodically “until a final determination of the case”.
The university, in a statement on Wednesday, said the comments by the lecturer were “unsavoury about the country, its history as well as its educational system.”
The professor, according to the statement, had been on sabbatical at the Department of Applied Linguistics since October 2018.
The university said it had in the past hosted several scholars on sabbatical leave from various countries including Nigeria.
“The University is highly disturbed by the huge embarrassment his unguarded statement has brought to the institution, the Ministry of Education, and, indeed, Ghana as a whole.
“The University after subjecting Prof. Augustine Uzoma Nwagbara to internal disciplinary process finds him culpable of gross misconduct and has, accordingly, dismissed him,” the statement said.
