Ex-President Of Nigerian Lecturers’ Union, ASUU, Dipo ‘Jingo’ Fasina Missing For Over One Week

Dipo Fasina, a former President of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), who is popularly known as ‘Jingo,’ has gone missing.

According to PREMIUM TIMES, Dr Fasina has been missing since Saturday, July 1, 2023.

Fasina was reportedly travelling to Algeria at the invitation of the Algerian government when he missed his connecting flight from Istanbul, Turkey.

His whereabouts have since remained unknown, the report said.

Incumbent ASUU president, Prof. Emmanuel Sodeke, confirmed that Fasina’s whereabouts were unknown in an interview with PREMIUM TIMES on Sunday.

Osodeke however, added that the lecturers’ union was working hard to ensure Fasina’s safe return home.

“Yes, we are aware of the development and we are working on it, so when we are through in the next two or three days we will let you know,” Osodeke told PREMIUM TIMES on the phone.

Also, the Chairman of the Nigerians in Diaspora Commission (NiDCOM), Abike Dabiri-Erewa, confirmed to PREMIUM TIMES that the organisation was aware that Fasina was missing.

She said NiDCOM was “working on it”.

Fasina, a polyglot, reportedly speaks Yoruba, English, French, Russian, and Ukrainian. He also reads and translates German and Spanish.

Fasina was the founding coordinator of the Philosophy Department of the Ogun State University (now Olabisi Onabanjo University).

According to reports, he directed that his honorarium be used to establish the departmental library.

Fasina’s activism got him into trouble with the Nigerian government on multiple occasions. In 1986, he was detained by the Ibrahim Babangida regime. In 2001, he was elected National President of ASUU, during which he led one of the longest strikes by academics in Nigeria’s history.

Fasina once had an altercation with President Olusegun Obasanjo in the Presidential Villa, with the President getting angry at a point and walking out during their meeting.