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The Abia State University (ABSU), Uturu, has announced plans to recruit nearly 300 new academic staff, alongside the promotion of long-stagnated teaching and non-teaching staff, as part of its expansion and reform agenda.

The Pro-Chancellor and Chairman of the Governing Council, Rt. Hon. Agwu U. Agwu, PhD, disclosed this during a weekend chat with The Guardian after the 158th Regular Session of the Governing Council, held since its inauguration in March 2025.

Agwu revealed that two 5,000-bed capacity hostels—one for male and one for female students—are currently under construction. He added that the institution is preparing to admit over 10,000 new students in the next academic circle, raising total enrolment from 20,000 to 30,000.

On staff welfare, he announced that promotions would be made public on Monday, September 1, 2025.

“The Governing Council in this meeting approved the promotion of so many staff, including Professors, Readers, Senior Lecturers, and other senior non-teaching staff that stagnated for the past four or five years,” he said.

“By Monday, there will be smiles on the faces of many of the teaching and non-teaching staff in the University.”

Agwu recalled that the first batch of promotions for Professors and Readers had been approved earlier in March during the Council’s inaugural session.

Speaking on the prevailing industrial peace in the university, he credited the progress to the intervention of Governor Alex Otti, who assumed office on May 29, 2023.

“There is no more arrears of salaries of workers in ABSU. The government has cleared the backlog of 11 months’ salary for the staff of the university,” Agwu stated.

“The workers do not need to be told to sustain this industrial peace, because what led to past strikes is known to all parties and is being addressed holistically. If 90 percent of your problems have been addressed or are being handled by the Visitor, what need is there for industrial action?

The Pro-Chancellor listed past challenges as unpaid salaries, insecurity, poor water and power supply, and dilapidated hostels. He noted ongoing projects, including the construction of two ultramodern 10,000-bed hostels, renovation of existing facilities, new faculty buildings, and the approval of ₦830 million for engineering equipment.

“Today, ABSU has been reconnected to the national grid, all because of His Excellency. The students have access to clean pipe-borne water, and renovation of two hostels is nearly completed. The bad spot between ABSU and Okigwe has also been massively addressed. I am sure that in the next one week or so, we will spend less than ten minutes from Okigwe to the main campus in Uturu. That spot that used to hold people for two or three hours will soon be a thing of the past,” he said.

On the directive to relocate the Umuahia Campus, which houses the Faculties of Agriculture and Law, back to Uturu, Agwu confirmed that the process is underway.

“The movement is progressing. His Excellency visited the school and saw the need to put in place adequate infrastructure for the seamless transfer from Umuahia back to Uturu. Once the reconstruction and construction work is done, then we’ll move,” he explained.

“He is a listening Governor. When we explained the challenges of moving immediately, he saw reason with the management. He visited the school and took it upon himself to ensure that by the time everything is put in place, the people here will even be eager to move back to Uturu.

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