The National Open University of Nigeria (NOUN) has described as fake news a report by an “obscure website” claiming that the institution was recruiting.

A statement issued on Friday in Abuja by NOUN Director of Media and Publicity, Malam Ibrahim Sheme.

Sheme stated that the fake news was published by a website jobcenternigeria.com with a phone number of 0805 860 6531.

“The website’s false alarm, published on June 20, 2020, was mischievously headlined as Massive Recruitment at NOUN.

“NOUN has no recruitment drive for either teaching or non-teaching staff or junior staff, and is not recruiting any staff in any category.

“It is obvious that jobcentrenigeria.com was designed to be scamming millions of Nigerians into believing there are vacancies in respected institutions such as NOUN.

“Perhaps, its promoters were recruited by elements within and or outside NOUN to create a Denial of Service (DOS) application attack on the university in the public domain, giving the impression of a secretive recruitment drive.

“For the record, NOUN does not employ any staff without following the necessary steps for recruitment of any staff in a federal organisation,” Sheme said.

He also said that the university, after following due processes, had stopped all recruitment since joining the government’s new salary platform, the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS) in October 2019.

Sheme also noted that NOUN no longer operates a “School” system since 2016 when it started using the “Faculty” system for its academic units.

He said: “The university joined the IPPS system as ordered by the Office of the Accountant-General of the Federation, and with that, has closed all recruitment of all categories of staff indefinitely.

“The fact that jobcentrenigeria is still calling the Faculties schools reflects the mischievous and ignorant nature of the organisation and its calculated attempt to tarnish the image of the management of the university.

“The website also revealed its ignorance further by claiming that the university has vacancies in some listed study centres; this is another blatant lie.

“Each of the study centres listed has a fully functioning, highly qualified director who has been a staff of the university for more than five years.

“The university is not unmindful of the desperation of saboteurs of the excellent achievements and giant strides made by the present management in the last four years and are therefore using scam sites such as jobcentrenigeria to rubbish these achievements.”

He said NOUN, however, remained undeterred in ensuring that Nigerians had affordable access to quality education at any place, at their pace.

The Sheme further added that the website “Jobcentralnigeria” had no authority to declare vacancies on behalf of NOUN and as such, the university would consider legal action against its owners to protect the name and integrity of the university. (NAN)

count | 16

National Open University of Nigeria (NOUN) not recruiting says management