Tax Reform Bill: ASUU Warns FG Not to Scrap TETFUND for NELFUND

•Says such move will destroy public varsities  

•TETFund product of ASUU; other African countries emulating it 

•Education sector stakeholders, VCs, pro-VCs not consulted

Onuminya Innocent in Sokoto

The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), Sokoto Zone, has warned the federal government not to phase out the Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFund), saying it has helped to transform tertiary educational institutions in Nigeria in the last three decades.

Speaking at a press conference held at the Nigerian Union of Journalists (NUJ) Press Centre in Sokoto, the chairman of the Sokoto zone, Professor Abubakar Sabo, explained that suffocating the funding source of TETFund to run the Nigerian Education Loan Fund (NELFUND) would destroy public education in the country.

“The only source of funding is from TETFund, so when you destroy it, you have destroyed public universities,” Sabo stated.

He alleged that some members of the ruling class “want to destroy public universities and ensure that the children of the poor remain slaves”.

The ASUU chairman faulted the tax reform bills introduced by the President Bola Tinubu administration. He said stakeholders were not consulted within the educational sector before the bills were sent to the National Assembly.

Sabo said, “TETFund is a product of ASUU. You can’t make the tax laws without meeting with ASUU for inputs before proposing it before the National Assembly.

“The Vice Chancellors were not consulted; Pro-Chancellors were not consulted. The people sat down somewhere and said over the next five years let’s scrap it without consulting those who initiated this bill that has transformed Nigerian public universities.

“That’s not how to work in a system. That’s not how to run a country that is democratic.”

Sabo maintained that rather than systematically phasing out TETFund, which derived its funding from consolidated revenue from company income tax, the government should bankroll the newly formed NELFUND from Value Added Tax (VAT).

According to him, “Let that Act that was initiated in 1993 that has transformed all Nigerian universities, be allowed to stay. If you want to drive NELFUND, go and look for ways to fund it. Don’t take from the one that is in existence to fund it.

“When you go around all Nigerian universities, polytechnics and Colleges of Education today, 90 per cent of the physical structures you have there are products of this struggle for TETFUND.

“But this tax bill is saying that by the year 2030, it should be scrapped and merged with NASENI and NITDA and then reduced to two per cent.”

He explained, “When you go outside the country, companies fund universities, they give grants, which companies are not doing in Nigeria. The only one they are doing is this two per cent. So, they should not look at it as tax but investment to produce graduates that would work for you.

“Other countries in Africa are emulating this TETFund. I will give you an example: Ghana. Because of this, in 2021, Ghana passed their GETFUND – Ghana Education Trust Fund. They got theirs from VAT.”

Sabo further stated, “If you are starting your programme, which is NELFUND, there is no problem. Challenge the academia, we will tell you how to fund it. We will give you a way to fund it without tampering with the one on the ground.”

The union asked the government to “let the poor breath” and not suffocate them with anti-people policies.

Sabo stated, “Our issue with NELFUND is that in a country like Nigeria, it should be grants; and not a loan.

“All the universities are increasing their fees now; jerking up their fees so that the students will borrow more loans from this NELFUND, encumbering the children of the poor.

“Allow TETFund as approved by the military based on the efforts of Nigerian lecturers, for whom many died: Mahmood Tukur died for that struggle. Don’t destroy it because once you destroy it, you have destroyed Nigerian education.

“It is not about ASUU; it is about the future of Nigeria. Nigerian government gives less than 10 per cent to education. In West Africa, the minimum budget allocation is 15 per cent.”