Many colleagues and associates of Chikaodinaka Nwankpa, a US-based Nigerian professor of Engineering, are still left in shock after it was found out he spent some $200,000 fund on strip clubbing and odd purchases.
This sharply betrays Nwankpa’s profile which positions him as a serious and dedicated scholar.
Here is one of his bios: He received his Magistr Diploma in Electric Power Systems from St. Petersburg State Polytechnic University, Russia and his Ph.D. degree the Illinois Institute of Technology. He is currently a Full Professor in the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department at Drexel University and serves as Director for the Center for Electric Power Engineering that focuses on energy and power related research. He is a past recipient of a NSF Engineering Research Initiation Award and a Presidential Faculty Fellow Award. He is a Past Chair of the Power and Energy Circuits and Systems Technical Committee of the IEEE Circuits and Systems Society. His research interests are in the areas of power systems and power electronics. His recent work has been in power electronic converters, analog VLSI circuits, power system computational methods and information embedded power and energy systems.
According to reports, although Nwankpa boasts having attracted up to $10m to institutions he worked, the
grant money he spent on strippers was issued by the Navy, the Department of Energy, and the National Science Foundation.
The grant Nwankpa has, however, squandered was aimed at energy, science and naval research, but specifically, the man was found to have misspent $189,062.
“Upon being confronted, the head of the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering admitted the unauthorized expenses, resigned his post, and agreed to pay back $53,328 — less than a third of the overall bill he ran up.
“The Justice Department announced on Monday October 7, that the University agreed to a $190,000 settlement to fend off a potential lawsuit. A university spokesperson said that Drexel reported Nwankpa’s misconduct to authorities and cooperated with the investigation. Since then, the school has instituted additional training for faculty and staff and beefed up its auditing controls,” reports add.
Nwankpa has consequently been barred from federal contracting for six months, prosecutors said, but he has not been charged with a crime. A spokesperson for U.S. Attorney William M. McSwain’s office said Monday’s settlement did not preclude prosecution of Nwankpa.
“This is an example of flagrant and audacious fraud, and a shameful misuse of public funds,” said McSwain, whose office negotiated the agreement with Drexel after an investigation by the Naval Criminal Investigative Service and the inspectors general of the U.S. Energy Department and the National Science Foundation.
