Gov. Charles Soludo of Anambra State has called for a strategic partnership with the Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFund) toward the delivery of intervention projects in higher institutions in the state.
Soludo made the call during a visit to the Executive Secretary of TETFund, Sonny Echono, in Abuja on Tuesday.
He said such collaboration would bring about a more robust impact as it relates to TETFund’s projects in the state.
According to him, we have a big dream, a big agenda to partner with you and other critical stakeholders to ensure we achieve desired results when it comes to TETFUND project .
” The Federal Government is a very critical player in this field.of education as we know education is on the concurrent list. The federal and state work together.
” The only way we can make it work for ourselves is to work together through collaboration, coordination and cooperation, and coincidentally the resource envolope of the federation is dispprotionate here in Abuja.
“I will like us to work together in a whole lot of areas we are interested in and in some years to come, we will be able to say with partnership with TETFund we were able to deliver ABCD,”” he said.
The governor commended TETFund for its various intervention projects across the country.
He added that the three state-owned tertiary institutions in the state; Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu, University, Anambra Polytechnic, Mgbakwu and College of Education, Nsugbe, were eager to welcome more ntervention projects of the fund.
He, however, expressed concern over the growing number of tertiary institutions in the country, saying government might find it difficult to adequately fund them in the future.
“With the tertiary institutions going the way they are now, there are still questions and issues we are not asking.
” At some point we are going to ask whether or how the government will be able to fund or adequately fund the number or the plethora of institutions or the mechanism of our delivery, especially with the brick and mortar system that we have, there will be questions.
“But in the interim, before we get there, TETFund has been filling the gap in terms of infrastructure in our tertiary institutions.
” As you go from one higher institution to the other, (you see them) you have a way of branding them – the projects,” he said.
Soludo, who said TETFund had done a lot in view of the limited resources available to it compared to the massive needs of the higher education sector, said “even if the federal government is to spend its entire capital budget on education, it will not be enough to address all the issues” .
Responding, the Executive Secretary of TETFund, Sonny Echono said the fund had continued to do a lot both in infrastructure and academic content development.
Echono, who said TETFund projects are everywhere in tertiary institutions in Anambra State, especially in Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka, said the fund would do more in the state-owned institutions.
“In Anambra, you will see a lot of our presence, but I admit at the level of state institutions we need to do more.
“TETFUND has put in place mechanisms through specialised training to ensure Nigerian graduates are easily employable.
“The fund has trained over 35,000 academic staff with the Centres of Excellence churning out cutting-edge research to meet Nigeria’s developmental needs,” he said.
Echono said that in the last 11 years, 35,000 academic staff had been trained in Master’s and PhDs, adding that a lot had been done in research component of its intervention.
He, therefore, said that the fund was also working on the employability of graduates by linking the institutions with industries.
