The Federal Government on Friday inaugurated a 22-member committee on the Needs Assessment of Nigerian Universities.
The committee was set up in line with the agreement reached between the Federal Government, Academic Staff of Nigerian Universities (ASUU), Non-Academic Staff Unions, and other stakeholders in the nation’s education sector.
The Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), Pius Anyim, said that the committee was set up in furtherance of government’s desire to revitalise the Nigerian tertiary institutions for a robust and healthy development of education.
He said that budgetary funding of universities was a strategic application while the non-budgetary and private interventions appeared not to address priority areas.
Mr. Anyim said the committee was also set up to revitalise the physical infrastructure in the universities.
He said that the projects which were expected to enhance the Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) base of the various institutions would help to cater for the welfare of staffers as well as the administrative needs of the universities on sustainable basis.
He said that the committee was mandated to interface with all agencies providing support to the universities with the aim of channeling assistance to priority areas as well as stimulate private sector investment into public universities.
Mr. Anyim said that the committee would monitor the progress of project implementation, produce quarterly report for submission to government and intervene in matters that would be crucial to the achievement of the assignment.
The committee has Governor Gabriel Suswam of Benue as Chairman and Professor Mahmood Yakubu, TETFUND Executive Secretary as Vice Chairman.
Other members are representatives of the Senate Committee on Education and its counterpart in the House of Representatives, the Office of the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, ASUU, the Ministry of Education, Labour and Productivity, Finance, NUC, among others.
Responding on behalf of members of the committee, Mr. Suswam, who expressed his appreciation for the confidence reposed in them by President Goodluck Jonathan, promised to carry out the assignment.
He assured that with the latest assignment, challenges facing the Nigerian university system would be a thing of the past while also calling on stakeholders for smooth synergy in making the assignment a success.
