By Ezrel Tabiowo
Abuja
The Senate yesterday began moves to probe alleged diversion of about N200 billion of the education tax collected by the Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFund) between 2012 and 2013.
It was alleged that the sum was diverted to “unknown and unspecified uses not recognised in or permitted under the TETFund establishment Act, 2011.”
The probe by the upper chamber will also cover alleged misappropriation of the Education Tax Fund from 2011-2015.
TETFund’s Executive Secretary, Prof. Suleiman Elias Bogoro, was summoned by the Senate to face appear before its Committee on Tertiary Institutions to explain the reported diversion and other irregularities at TETFund.
This followed the adoption of a motion “Gross Mismanagement of Education Tax Fund 2011-2015” sponsored by Senator Abdullahi Aliyu Sabi (APC Niger North) at yesterday’s plenary.
In lead debates, Sabi reported that the TETFund Board granted a loan to the Ministry of Education and also organised a workshop and pre-retreat in the United States of America and Kenya in 2014-2015 without recourse to the guidelines of the TETFund Act.
He also disclosed that “a whopping sum of about N500 million was budgeted for advertising and media” in TETFund’s 2015 budget.
He said the vote contravened the “’rehabilitation, restoration and consolidation of tertiary education in Nigeria in accordance with Section 3(1) of the Tertiary Education Trust Fund (Establishment, etc,) Act 2011.”
The Senator said after spending nearly N1 trillion between 2011and 2015 by TETFund still the state of infrastructure tertiary education institutions were still “shabby, dilapidated and mostly run down.”
Following the resolution to probe TETFUND, the Senate President, Bukola Saraki, directed the Committee on Tertiary Institutions to report back to the Senate in a month.
“I want the Committee to do a thorough job and within a month report to the Senate so that we get a clearer picture of the situation,” he said.
