The former chairman of the kogi state Council of the Nigeria Union of Journalists,NUJ Comrade Alih Atabor has advocated for the listing of private tertiary institutions in the country on Tetfund programme for their immense contribution to development of education.
Comrade Ali Atabor made the appeal on the sideline of the 5th convocation of Salem University Lokoja, held on Friday 25 Nov., 2022.
He said the financial challenges facing both government and private tertiary institutions cannot be overemphasized, hence the need for government to assist private tertiary institutions with Tetfund to overcome some of their development challenges.
He said TetFund is a pool funded by public liability companies operating in the country in which some of the promoters of this Organisations operate higher institutions, hence the need for them to benefit from the scheme
He said the complementary role of private institutions to advancement of education in Nigeria cannot be quantified, hence, listing them on Tetfund intervention like their Government institutions , will help solve their funding challenges.
According to him, ” Our public institutions from Monotechnic to University, most of the structures, 80% of them were built by the Tetfund funding. The Private Institutions are equally contributing to the manpower development. They should be assisted. It may not be of the same proportion, but certain percentage should be allocated to them.
” For instance, the Vice chancellor of this University, Professor Alewo Johnson Akubo, complained of funding, and I want to believe that not all that they are facing that he revealed to us here. This is the more reason, i will join my voice with others to call on Federal Government to enlist Private Tertiary institutions on TetFund programme to ease their day to day operations.” He solicited.
The former chairman whose son Francis Alih Atabor was among the graduands, said he was confident that all is not lost with Nigeria , as the galaxy of young men and women having their day today would put the Country back on sound footing.
Atabor noted that he was convinced that there is hope for Nigeria, saying the graduands tagged ” Change Agent” would build from where the present generation have stopped for the betterment of the incoming generation.
