By all accounts, the provision of quality tertiary education in a sustainable way is a serious business that requires huge capital investment.
This perception is by all means rational, as the incessant strikes by the various unions of the nation’s tertiary educational institutions over the years could be attributed to financial demands.
For instance, the Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU, recently asked for over N1.5 trillion from the Federal Government as a pre-condition for suspending its five-month-old strike which had paralysed academic activities in the nation’s universities.
ASUU said that the funds would be used to provide basic infrastructure that would sustain effective learning and make the university system more functional and sustainable.
Besides, ASUU insisted that a minimum of 26 per cent of the annual budget should be allocated to the education sector.
Similar reasons were also adduced for the closure of the country’s polytechnics for more than 10 months, until recently when the strike was called off, following the intervention of the new Minister of Education, Malam Ibrahim Shekarau.
The huge financial requirements of the country’s tertiary institutions informed the Federal Government’s decision to establish the Tertiary Education Trust Fund, TETFund, in 2011.
The Fund is charged with the responsibility of managing, monitoring and disbursing proceeds from the Education Tax to public tertiary institutions in Nigeria.
The Act establishing the Fund imposes a 2 per cent Education Tax on the assessable profits of all registered companies in the country.
TETFund also monitors the projects executed with the funds allocated to the beneficiaries.
More than three years down the line, many of the tertiary institutions have been complaining about their inability to have access to funds from TETFund because of a number of factors.
However, Prof. Suleiman Bogoro, the Fund’s Executive Secretary, however, said that one of the major challenges facing the funding programme was the inability of some tertiary institutions to access over N67 billion of the funds earmarked to boost their teaching and learning infrastructure.
Bogoro, spoke recently when he received members of the House Representatives’ Committee on Education, led by its Chairman, Rep. Aminu Suleiman, who were on an oversight visit to the organisation.
He described the trend as worrisome, in view of the general complaints about poor funding of tertiary institutions, leading to persistent strikes by the unions of the institutions over the years.
He stressed that the Fund had not recorded any failed project across the country because of its stringent guidelines on funds’ disbursement and execution of projects.
Bogoro, however, identified improper documentation and problems associated with financial reports as some of the major factors limiting the access of tertiary institutions to the funds.
“In the past, TETFund observed with dismay that one of the major problems associated with accessing funds was improper documentation and rendition of financial returns.
“It is this problem that necessitated the Fund to come up with a draft format on efficient and effective guidelines for projects, programmes and financial reports,’’ he said.
He said that TETFund’s insistence on strict adherence to the guidelines was posing a challenge for the institutions in their efforts to easily access the funds.
To ease such difficulties, Borogo said that TETFund was taking a second look at the guidelines so as to ease the hurdles without utter disregard for the due process, as well as laid-down rules and regulations.
“In view of this, TETFund recently held a stakeholders’ interactive workshop and town hall meetings in tertiary institutions across the six geo-political zones of the country,’’ he said.
He said that the workshop helped in sensitising the stakeholders to essential aspects of the Public Procurement Act, owing to complaints about the inability of the beneficiaries of TETFund to comply with the Act’s requirements.
Bogoro, however, expressed the Fund’s commitment towards effective and efficient delivery of its projects, in line with the Transformation Agenda of President Goodluck Jonathan’s administration.
Nevertheless, Dr Musa Babayo, the Chairman of TETFund’s Board of Trustees, bemoaned the fact that the institutions, which received N22.3 billion as intervention funds in the last 10 years, had under-utilised the funds.
He expressed the regret at a recent capacity-building programme organised for laboratory technologists drawn from tertiary institutions in the North-Central and South-West zones in Ilorin.
Shedding more light on the under-ulisation of the funds by the beneficiaries, Babayo said that the funds were released as intervention funds to procure technical and laboratory equipment for the institutions’ laboratories
“However, some of the equipment were not installed, while others were under-utilised or not properly maintained by the benefiting institutions,’’ said Babayo, who was represented by a former Executive Secretary of the Fund, Alhaji Idris Saidu.
He said that the under-utilisation of the funds was largely due to the lack of trained laboratory technologists in the area of technical and vocational education across the country.
“Specifically, between 2004 and 2007, N7 billion was allocated to technical and vocational education, while N15.3 billion was released in 2011 for technical/vocational equipment.
“This was done through the National Board for Technical Education, NBTE, to the tertiary institutions,” he said.
He, nonetheless, said that TETFund recognised the importance of laboratories and technologists in efforts to facilitate and enhance teaching and research activities in the area of scientific studies in tertiary institutions.
Babayo said that the recognition kindled the Fund’s interest in providing intervention funds for the procurement of laboratory equipment for the tertiary institutions.
“It has, therefore, become imperative that we match capacity-building programmes to funds allocated for interventions in all tertiary institutions to ensure optimal benefit for the educational sector and the nation,’’ he said.
All the same, some tertiary institutions have applauded TETFund for its intervention programmes, saying that the Fund had been their last resort in their efforts to boost capacity building and infrastructural development.
Prof. Godwin Onu, the Rector, Federal Polytechnic , Oko, Anambra State, said that over 500 members of the polytechnic’s staff had benefitted from the TETFund’s capacity building programme via its oversees training scheme.
“TETFund is one of the best innovations of the Federal Government to intervene in the funding of tertiary institutions in the country.
“I also commend the Fund’s methods of engagement, disbursement and monitoring mechanism to ensure that funds are utilised by the institutions,’’ he added.
Sharing similar sentiments, Dr Comfort Oko of the University of Calabar, lauded TETFund but underscored the need to adopt a more proactive approach to enable more institutions to adequately access TETFund’s funding.
Describing TETFund as “the mainstay of tertiary institutions in Nigeria’’, Dr Barakat Abubakar, Provost, Federal College of Education (Technical), Gusau, nonetheless, appealed to the Fund to consider funding sports development programmes in tertiary institutions.
Mr. Gbade Adesola, the Registrar, Federal School of Survey, FSS, Oyo, however, decried the exclusion of monotechnics from the Fund’s coverage.
“If the Fund is meant for tertiary education and we offer such programmes, which other beneficiary institutions like polytechnics, colleges of education and universities similarly offer; we, therefore, deserve to be included in TETFund’s funding programme.
“We also offer post-HND programmes which enable our students to be registered as surveyors,’’ he said.
However, Mr. Usman Wali, the TETFund’s Desk Officer at the Federal College of Education, Gombe, said that the college had accessed N3.1 billion from 2009 to date.
He said that part of the funds was used for sponsoring 115 lecturers for PhD. and Master’s degree programmes within the country and abroad.
“In accessing TETFund’s funds, an institution is expected to decide on the project it wants to execute before communicating this to TETFund. It is also expected to include the bill of quantity and the designs for the project.
“With the coming of TETFund, we are now financing the publication of journals and researches,’’ Wali said.
Mr. Niyi Oduwole, the Head of Corporate Affairs, Olabisi Onabanjo University, Ago-Iwoye, noted that in spite of the challenges, TETFund ought to be commended for improving tertiary education in Nigeria.
“TETFund must be commended for what they are doing to improve the standard of tertiary education in Nigeria.
“With TETFund, we have been able to boost our service delivery through the provision of infrastructure and capacity building programmes for both teaching and non-teaching staff.
“Over 157 teaching and non-teaching staff have benefitted from the training programmes, while we received special intervention funds in 2013 to the tune of N350 million for building the Faculty of Science complex.
“Between 2009 and 2012, we got intervention funds to the tune of N1.2 billion and this was used for the provision of a main library, entrepreneurship centre, mechatronic laboratory, lecture theatre and office furniture.
“If TETFund can continue in this regard, institutions in Nigeria will, in the long run, be able to function well as their foreign counterparts,’’ Oduwole said.
As part of efforts to expand the access of the country’s tertiary institutions to funding, the Federal Government recently disbursed N135 billion from TETFund’s funds to public universities, polytechnics and colleges of educations nationwide.
The Minister of Education, Malam Ibrahim Shekarau, while disbursing the funds to the beneficiaries, said that each of the nation’s public universities would get N912 million, while N661 million would be given to each polytechnic.
He added that N581 million would go to each of the nation’s colleges of education.
“The quantum of funds allocated to institutions has increased considerably. This year, amount for direct allocation to the beneficiaries has increased by 41 per cent for universities, 49 per cent for polytechnics and 48 per cent for colleges of education, compared to allocations in 2013,” he said.
Shekarau, however, warned that the Federal Government would not hesitate to sanction any institution which diverts the funds for any other purposes.
“These are resources invested in our public institutions for public good. Institutions must, therefore, demonstrate fiscal responsibility and commitment to ethical standards,” he said.
All in all, stakeholders in the education sector urge TETFund to sustain its tempo of intervention, while ensuring effective monitoring of projects’ implementation in order to justify the raison d’être behind its establishment.
They, however, advise the Fund to make pragmatic efforts to remove all perceptible encumbrances limiting the access of tertiary institutions to its intervention funds. NAN