Prof Cyril Ndifon, Dean of the Faculty of Law of the University of Calabar, has reacted to allegations of harassing female law students sexually alleging a conspiracy by fellow academics he defeated in the dean election to tarnish his image.
Several students had staged a protest in the institution, accusing Ndifon of frequently harassing them sexually.
They moved about in groups on the campus late Monday afternoon chanting, ‘Ndifon, go! go!’The students displayed placards with various inscriptions, including “Ndifon Must Go!” “Prof Ndifon, let the girls with big bre***s breathe, stop suffocating us!!!”, “Law Girls Are Not Bonanza”, “Prof Ndifon Must Stop Grabbing our B** B**”
.President of the Law Students Association of Nigeria, LAWSAN, Unical branch, Comrade Benedict Otu, led the students in the protest. But in an interview with CrossRiverWatch, an online platform, the Dean debunked the allegations.
He claimed that the protest by the law students was masterminded by some persons in the faculty who had sworn to pull him down.
Ndifon described the allegations as barefaced lies aimed at tarnishing his image.
He said: “Since I defeated some persons in an election that was keenly contested, to emerge as Dean of the faculty, it hasn’t been easy. I had skipped several booby traps. These allegations are baselessly masterminded by my detractor, who had vowed to ensure that my image is dragged to the mud just because I won the faculty elections twice.
“If you look at the placards you will discover that the placards have one person’s handwriting. Again how come the protesters know that we were holding a meeting with the Vice Chancellor if it is not the handiwork of an insider. “We were supposed to hold a meeting with the Vice Chancellor to enable us iron out important issues troubling us in the faculty, while the meeting was on-going, we were told that some students were outside with placards, protesting against me, demanding that I should be unseated.
“From what am told, LAWSAN President, Benedict Otu, cajoled some students that they were to go for a meeting with the Vice Chancellor at her office, only to dish out placards bearing false representations about the Dean, and asked his colleagues to chant slogans that berated my personality.
“This won’t work. Colleagues of mine who are bent on tarnishing my reputation just to destroy me. The question is where are the victims of sexual harassment. Can someone harass girls without the ladies coming out to raise the alarm that they were sexually harassed?