President Jonathan has urged administrators of all Public Higher institutions in Nigeria to access over sixty five billion Naira intervention and special impact fund domiciled in the Tertiary education trust fund account by the Federal government.
The President who was represented by the Secretary to the Federal Government, Anyim Pius Anyim , at the National conference on Transparency ,Accountability and Ethical Values organised by the fund, Independent corrupt practices and other related offences, expressed worry over the inability of Vice-Chancellors to access the fund since 2009 .
“The presence of Chief Executive of tertiary institutions from all over the country is particularly significant on the issues that are being discussed and transcends ownership and proprietorship of the institution, whether they are public or private and ensuring transparency and ethical values in our institution and cultivating and we must all work together in the interest of our nation.”
He added that the funds had accumulated over a number of years in Tetfund account.
He added that the objective of the support was to turn tertiary institutions in Nigeria into centers of excellence.
“Apart from the regular intervention funds, TETFund has also made available the high impact grants to a number of institutions to facilitate rapid restoration where regular intervention funds are not sufficient, Under my watch tertiary institutions will continue to get support in financing” the President assured.
Dr Jonathan restated the commitment of his administration to support all tertiary institutions in the country.
“I have received report that a good number of our institutions are not able to access the funds in Tetfund, this fund has accumulated over a number of years in Tetfund account, this funds which runs into billions of naira. We must fast forward the development of our tertiary institutions.”
In his welcome address Chairman Board of Trustees of Tetfund, Dr. Musa Babayo, said in view of the funds invested into tertiary institutions by the federal government, the problem of the education sector is not so much the problem of lack of funds or human resources but rather the problem centres on human factor.
“In 2011, Education Trust Fund, ETF, was renamed Tetfund by the ETF Act No. 16 and refocused to intervene in only public tertiary institutions (Universities, Polytechnics and Colleges of Education) for maximum impact as opposed to ETF which intervened at all levels of education (Primary, secondary and tertiary).
“Between 2009 to 2014 the fund in keeping with its mandate has injected a colossal sum of N456, 559, 693, 398 .18 into the Nigeria education Sector, while N65, 647, 033, 895.33 is yet to be accessed. This is exclusive of the recent N100 Billion intervention by the federal government based on the federal government and Academic Staff of universities Union, ASUU, Agreement.
“Given the amount of funds invested in the tertiary education system, I firmly and truly believe that the problem of this sector is not so much the problem of lack of funds or human resources but rather the problem centers on human factor. No amount of finances can turn around our higher educational institutions if the people managing them are not committed, transparent, accountable and place high premium on ethical values”.
Chairman of ICPC, Mr. Ekpo Nta in his address said ICPC is worried that some of the funds accessed haven’t yielded the desired results.
He said ICPC is interested in the prevention of corruption, “In line with emerging global practices, ICPC like some of its counterparts of the world is very interested in the prevention of corruption.
Based on our investigations arising from petitions and intelligence gathering, the trend so far clearly shows that lack of transparency and accountability is one of the major factors at the root of the endemic corruption in our institutions, both public and private.
