Hilary Owamah: All Odds Were Against Me Becoming DVC, Appreciates VC, Four Others

By Daniel Dafe

Deputy Vice Chancellor (Academic), Delta State University, DELSU, Abraka, Prof. Hilary Owamah, has said that his appointment came by divine intervention, saying the odds were not in his favour.

He said this on Friday, 18th April, 2025, during an exclusive chat with Oasis Magazine in his office, weeks after he assumed the new position.

Asked what his initial reaction was when the Vice Chancellor, Prof. Samuel Asagba nominated him for the position, he said: “The rumors started growing thick a few weeks to the nomination, but looking at the caliber of professors in DELSU and the requirement that one must have been a professor for at least five years, I considered the rumors fake since I was just two years as a professor and the Vice-Chancellor, an Okpe man and not from Delta North, even though I do not believe in tribal sentiments. So, I really did not see how it was going to happen.”

He continued: “The Vice Chancellor is from Okpe. He has never been close to me and I have never worked in Abraka Campus until I was appointed Director of Academic Planning by the immediate past Vice-Chancellor, Prof. Andy Egwunyenga. When the current Vice-Chancellor, Prof Asagba was Head of Department, I was not here. When he was Dean, I was not here. Even when he was Provost, I do not think I was here or that was the time I was employed and then when he was DVC Admin, I was in Oleh. I am not close to him. I do not know his wife or his children. I do not know anything about him. He was the one doing his analysis on who to work with as he passed through his interview and contest rigours, all alone.

“This our own is come and work with me position and when rumors began to spread that he was zeroing his attention on me, I was like by age I am very young, by professorship I am very young though I know I have what it takes to serve the system even in a higher capacity having delivered well as the Director of Academic Planning and also being a diligent, cool-headed person. So, it began to thicken, but then there was the condition that I was not up to 5 years as a professor and the election was supposed to be in February, 2025. But fortunately for me, in the new Vice-Chancellor’s first Senate meeting of January, 2025, DELSU Senate unanimously repealed the condition and removed the five years clause.”

Speaking further, he said he owes what he has become today to four persons, adding that he will never forget them no matter what he later becomes in life.

He gave their names as Prof. Samuel O Asagba, Prof. Andy Egwunyenga, his late mother, Mrs Felicia Ada Owamah, his wife, Mrs Victoria Ifeyinwa Owamah and Prof. Emoyan Onoriode.

According to him, the VC is now, not just a mentor to him but also a father figure

In his words, “he placed me here, so I am holding this position in trust for him. I must therefore put in my very best to ensure his noble visions and mission for the University are well achieved. Sometimes, I skip meals just to attend to the demands of the office and close very late too, but I must do the work of he that sent me while it is day for the night cometh when no man can work. He has given me the responsibility to relieve him of some tasks; that I must do with joy because this is the greatest blessing I am receiving from anyone since I was born. So, I thank the Vice-Chancellor for finding me worthy and for trusting me even when he has never been my friend.”

Furthermore, he praised Prof. Egwunyenga who saw his potentials even as an Associate Professor and picked him “amongst the pool of professors in the university and appointed him as Acting Director of Academic Planning and then Director the next year, noting that If he had not brought him here, nobody would have seen and taken notice of all his performances.

He also revealed that his mother sold her wrappers to make sure her children went to school but unfortunately did not live long to enjoy the fruits of her labour.

“She was busy hiring people’s farms even as a secondary school teacher to make sure we went to school, he said.”

He prayed: “May her sacrificial soul, rest in peace.”

“Then, I also appreciate my beloved wife for being there for me all along. So these five persons are very key in my life whether alive or dead,” he averred.

In his closing remarks, he wholeheartedly appreciated Prof. Emoyan Onoriode, Director, Centre for Entrepreneurship, DELSU for his warmth friendship, contributions to his emergence as DVC and other sacrifices ever since they became friends many years ago.