Ebonyi State University Lecturer Speaks On The Alleged Issue Surrounding Female Student's Suicide...

Prof. Amechi Enyi, a senior lecturer at Ebonyi State University (EBSU), has responded to the claim that he was involved in Miss Favour Ugwuka's death, a female student there.

On Wednesday night, May 22, 2024, the Department of English and Literary Studies' last student took her own life after failing a specific course multiple times.

The now dead student was heard complaining in a voicemail gone public that the lecturer continued to let her down even after a year had passed. She stated that despite attending lectures and making every effort to pass the course over her extra year, the professor failed her.

In a widely shared video, the mother of the dead student was seen alleging the lecturer of causing her daughter's death. 

In a statement to reporters on Friday in Abakaliki, Prof. Enyi—who asserted that he had received threats from the mother who had passed away before the incident—said that the late student had only copied down three questions from the course's final test, which was in English statistics.

He went on to say that the claim that her death was connected to her academic pursuits was untrue.

“I’m Prof A U. Enyi of the Department of English and Literary Studies, Ebonyi State University, Abakaliki. It is unfortunate, it is quite unfortunate that the girl ended the way she did. I was shocked when I heard the news,” he stated. 

“It is not true that her death is related to an academic issue, I don’t see how somebody who was not victimized, someone who failed an exam would decide to take her own life. So, the first question one should ask in this circumstance should be, was she victimized?

And of course, you know that she may not have been the only person who wrote the exam and some [other] people may have failed also, so it is not true and, really that was my first reaction. How could she have decided to take her own life, that is if she took her life

How could she have decided to take her own life when she was not victimized in the exam?

Yes, I got to know about this student in February 2024 after we had uploaded our second-semester results. The results were already approved by the school because before we uploaded results so that students could have access to the results, the school management would have approved the results.

So the mother called me one night, she said that I was witch-hunting her daughter, that how could her daughter have passed all other courses only to fail my course?

And when I tried to explain to her the procedure of ascertaining such an accusation, she refused to listen then I had no choice but to disconnect the call.

And I didn’t dwell further on it because the university has a process for handling such matters. According to the university rules, the examination does not belong to the lecturer, we had submitted the results, the student scripts, the questions, and the marking scheme, so all these are the property of the university and they are all verifiable.

So, if anyone feels aggrieved, the process of recalling the papers is there. And what such an aggrieved person needs to do is not threaten my life, telling me that she is from Nsukka and that I will be dealt with.”