Members of the National Good Governance Tour have added their voice to the call on the Association Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) to call off its lingering strike, saying that the Federal Government has consistently demonstrated its commitment to the progress of the nation’s tertiary institutions especially in the area of providing necessary funding for infrastructure development through direct budgetary allocation and its various agencies.
The Team was concerned that despite the huge interventions made by the Federal Government especially through the Tertiary Education Trust Fund which accumulate into billions of Naira, ASUU still insisted on continuing with the strike.
Speaking on behalf of the NGGTour Team during an inspection of projects at the Kafanchan Campus, Kaduna State University, the representative of the Minister of Information, Mr. Kingsley Osadolor (Special Assistant, Media to the Minister) said Kaduna State was the 21st state visited by the Team since the Tour commenced, and observed that in all the 21 states so far, all tertiary institutions (both Federal and State owned) have benefited from Federal Government interventions.
“Kaduna is the 21st state visited in the NGGT … in the 20 states visited no institution was found without TETfund intervention.
“A third party impression of the ASUU issue would suggest that the Federal Government has not been committed to the development and well being of the higher institutions, but what we have discovered since the Tour commenced is that there are evidences of Federal Government interventions and those of its agencies in all the institutions visited.
“It is therefore important that ASUU leaders go back to work having made their point, and allow academic activities continue instead of crippling the whole system.”
“You cannot bridge the infrastructure gap overnight, it is not in the interest of our nation to allow the strike to linger for a day longer”, Osadolor urged.
Earlier, the Vice Chancellor of the Kaduna State University, Prof. William Qurix said
the Campus was established by law in 2004 and academic activities commenced in 2005 with 4 faculties namely, Arts, Sciences, Social and Management Sciences and Medicine.
He said the institution initially had 500 students but now has a student population of over 6,000.
The VC said other Faculties which include Pharmaceutical Sciences and Agriculture have been introduced adding that the Faculty of agric building was built by state government from 2011 to 2012.
Other projects include a 500 sitting capacity auditorium funded by TETFund. In addition, he said the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) budgeted about 1 billion naira to fund various projects on both campuses. Also, the NDIC is handling some projects.
President of the Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ), Mohammed Garba said the initiative by the Kaduna State Government was commendable. He said it would go a long way in assisting students to obtain higher education, while also lauding interventions by the TETfund and CBN.
He also commended the quality of work done in the various projects and called on the University management to ensure the completion of all projects started.
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