DELSU VC Lauds Workers’ “Bank” Amid Soaring Financial Indices

By Ben Nwanne

The Vice-Chancellor of Delta State University, Abraka,(DELSU) Professor Andy Egwunyenga has lauded the Delta State University Workers’ Multipurpose Co-operative Society Limited, Abraka for being a pillar of financial support for staff of the institution.

Professor Egwunyenga was speaking on Wednesday at the opening ceremony of the 36th Annual General meeting which took place at the Co-operative Society’s ultra-modern building, comprising an administrative block and an event Center located at the University’s site 3, along the Sapele-Agbor Road.

Describing the Society as ‘great’, Professor Egwunyenga expressed joy at the monumental progress recorded so far in its over 36 years of existence. His words: “The co-operative society has been strategic in the welfare of staff and retirees of the University. What we have seen today speaks volumes about the quality of the Management team.”

The top University Administrator, who has been a member of the Co-operative Society for 30 years since joining the services of the University, said he had never had any cause to regret his membership of the Association. He urged the Management team to continue to be proactive and innovative so that the Co-operative Society would continue to grow from “strength to strength” and be in a position to take care of the financial needs of families in the University.

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The President of the Co-operative Society, Mr Edward Agbure, a Deputy Registrar and Public Relations Officer of the university, expressed gratitude to the Vice-Chancellor and his Management team for finding time to personally attend the event despite their understandably tight work schedules.

An experienced Administrator, Mr Agbure noted that the DELSU Workers MPCS Ltd and similar Societies on campus remained major sources for the well-being of all members and should therefore be protected from the shenanigans of certain persons who seek personal gains. According to him, the Co-operative Society “is the commonwealth of members that cut across the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), Senior Staff Association of Nigeria Universities (SSANU), Non-Academic Staff Union (NASU) and National Association of Academic Technologists (NAAT). It is therefore our responsibility to ensure that it is isolated and jealously guarded against the conventional campus politics.”

He appealed to fellow Co-operators to ensure that leadership of the Co-operative Society did not fall into the wrong hands. Citing the American diplomat, Henry Kissinger, he noted that the task of the leader is to get his people from where they are to where they have not been, adding that the current Team had achieved that feat. He suggested that the position of President should be reserved for somebody who had been a member of the Management Committee because it is a training ground for the emergence of good leaders and a stabilizing factor in the co-operative for the past 36 years. He informed fellow Co-operators that the Society had greatly been repositioned, adding that the current trend in the Co-operative Movement “is the diversification of the activities by reinventing the Society for maximum generation of additional streams of income.”

Indeed, the current Management Committee has achieved a lot in diversifying revenue- yielding activities with the establishment of a carwash business, while the building of a Guest House has taken off effectively. Despite the very challenging operating environment, the Co-operative Society raked in over 148
Million Naira distributable net profit in the year under review, a vast improvement over the previous year’s performance of 127 Million Naira.

The event was moderated by the Director of Co-operatives, Delta State, Asaba, Mr. Onyekpe Chukwudi.