Insecurity: FG Funds Tertiary Institutions with N6bn

Kuni Tyessi in Abuja

In its bid to fight  insecurity in the nation’s ivory towers, the federal government has revealed that the sum of N6 billion had been invested from the 2023 Intervention Budget for security infrastructure in tertiary institutions across the country.

It added that it is set to release a total sum of N18 billion to six public universities under its Special High Impact Intervention.

Revealing this, the Executive Secretary of the Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFund) Sonny Echono, disclosed the aforementioned during a news briefing  in Abuja yesterday.

Giving a breakdown of the 2023 Intervention Budget of N320 billion, recently approved by President Muhammadu Buhari, Echono said each of the universities would  be given the sum of  N1 billion each, the sum of  N1 billion will be given to six polytechnics and six colleges of education will also get  N1 billion each, while saying that over 95 percent of the N320 billion total TETFund’s disbursement of 2023 would go directly to beneficiary public tertiary institutions.

Echono said the remaining five per cent of the allocation would be used for staff salaries and allowances, project monitoring and zonal capital projects.

He said that 62 per cent of the total disbursement (representing N198 billion) constituted the institutions’ annual direct disbursement, while 20 per cent of the disbursement (representing N64.2 billion) would be used for special disbursement.

The Special Intervention is usually at the discretion of the Board of Trustees for which allocations are zonal-based and are done equitably by the decision of the Board as enshrined in the enabling Act.

The Special High Impact Intervention, according to Echono seeks to massively inject funds into selected tertiary institutions to achieve a major turnaround through Programme Upgrades and Improvement in the teaching and learning environment.

According to Echono,  “Beneficiaries were selected based on the age of the institution per geo-political zones of Nigeria among other criteria.”

Echono said it is to give each university in the six geo-political zones N3 billion, while N1 billion would go to each polytechnic and each College of Education from each of the six geo-political zones.

“For this year, the special impact will be given to six universities and the six universities are; From the North Central zone we have Ibrahim Babangida University Lapai, from the North-east zone we have Federal University Wukari in Taraba state, from the North-west we have Federal University Birnin Kebbi, in the South-east we have Imo State University of agriculture and environmental sciences while in the south we have Edo state university and southwest we have Federal university of technology Akure, Ondo state.”

The beneficiary polytechnics are: “Federal Polytechnics Offa, Federal Polytechnic Gombe, Federal Polytechnic Kabo, Kano State, Anambra State Polytechnic, Federal Polytechnic of Oil and Gas, Bonny and Oyo State College of Agriculture and Technology, Igboora are to get N1billion each”

‘Also, Plateau State COE, Federal COE, Yola, Federal COE, Zaria, Enugu State COE, Delta State COE and Taiye Solarin COE are to get N1 billion each, “Echono added.

“As I said, last year, six Universities benefitted. We zone six every year and pick one from each zone. Next year another six will be picked and the same applies. You also noticed that there is a balance between the state and federal institution and that is how we spread it”

“Still on the High Impact, we also do the same for Polytechnics and the colleges of education. So we have N1 billion each for six polytechnics and N1 billion each for six colleges of education, specifically for high-impact projects.

“Under this Special impact project you can also see that we have 18 different states so it’s quite a big development to achieve,” he said.

On Special disbursement, Echono said that N6 billion had been allocated to institutions in security-prone areas, especially those institutions with internal security challenges as well as institutions with cases of adoptions.

He said that there was a need to implement projects in institutions within security-prone areas to enhance the security of the students and teachers.

On other intervention lines, Echono disclosed that the sum of N500 million had been allocated to some selected Colleges of Education from the six geopolitical zones for micro-teaching laboratories.