The Chairman for Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFund) and board of trustees, Kashim Ibrahim Imam has said that N116 billion has been expended on academic staff training and development. According to him, 30,000 scholars were supported in Universities, Colleges of Education and Polytechnics to bag their Masters and Phd. degrees between 2008 and 2020. TETFund, is also a special intervention measure in tertiary institutions across the country. Imam disclosed this Thursday in Damaturu, the Yobe state capital, while on an assessment tour of higher educational institutions in Borno and Yobe states. While announcing beneficiaries from the two states, TETFund’s Director of Academic Staff Training and Development, Mohammed Sulaiman disclosed: “There were about 2,789 scholars from Borno and Yobe states that bagged their Masters and Phd degrees at the cost of about N5.3 billion.” He added that the scholars completed their degree programmes in the last 12 years in Nigeria and foreign Universities. In a breakdown of beneficiaries and costs, he said out of 238 academic staff from University of Maiduguri (UNIMAID), 182 obtained their Phd degrees, while 54 got their Masters during the same period. “Under the academic staff training and development, we expended N1.314 billion on the training of 238 scholars,” he said.
On the Conference Attendance Grants to academic and non-academic staff, he told the Vice Chancellor UNIMAID, Prof. Aliyu Shugaba that N147.323 million had been expended on 165 non-academic and 98 academic staff between 2010 and 2017. He added that the Colleges of Education Maiduguri and Bama also had 150 and 46 beneficiaries from the academic staff training and development. According to him, Ramat Polytechnic, Maiduguri, had 331 beneficiaries at the total cost of N942.3 million. “Don’t expect TETFund to attend to all responsibilities of tertiary institutions in the country,” he warned. He noted that the N300 billion earmarked for special intervening projects was to complement sourced funds from Federal and State Governments. In Yobe state there are 1,624 scholars that benefited from the academic staff training and development. He said the beneficiaries are selected from Yobe State University (YSU), Federal University, Gashua, Federal Polytechnic and College of Education, Damaturu and Potiskum, Idriss Aloama Polytechnic, Gaidam and College of Education, Gashua. According to Imam, there was 100% success, as there was no abscondment of graduates since the fund’s inception of the training programme. On the challenges of training, Dr. Sabo Dagona, he said: “Even though we had not recorded any abscondment from Yobe state, the rise in foreign exchange rates to the pound or dollar be addressed. “
There is no parity between TETFund’s paid fees to Universities and the current foreign exchange rates to either the U.S dollar or British pound,” He therefore urged the fund to regularly review the scholarship awards to students under the training programme. He lamented that it was YSU that offset his tuition fees and other training expenses to complete Phd in Clinical Psychology in the UK. While responding to fluctuations in exchange rates, Sulaiman urged the institutions to open domiciliary accounts with their banks. On the way forward, YSU’s Vice Chancellor, Prof. Mala Daura, said: “We should continue to support the scholars by looking inwards to train them in various fields of research and development.” He said that the scholars after their training be exposed to meet global standards in research and development. “The laboratories and other research facilities could be upgraded to meet global standards,” he said. While thanking Imam, Prof. Shugaba disclosed that the Kidney and Urology Centres of University Maiduguri Teaching Hospital (UMTH) are to be upgraded with N750 million. According to him, after the upgrade of two centres, the hospital will perform kidney transplant. Other projects to be executed with TETFunds included the Centre for Arid Zone Studies, Website, Innovative and ICT centres at the cost of N4 billion.
