Sen. Abdullahi Adamu , says the ongoing amendments to the Tertiary Education Trust Fund Act is part of efforts to reinvigorate Colleges of Agriculture , to enable it contribute meaningfully to national development.
He said the TETFund Act Bill 2019, which had scaled first and second reading and currently before the relevant committee when passed and signed into law would restore the fortunes of the colleges. “Those who are benefitting from the Fund often take away the good hands from the COA to their institutions because they have the financial capability.“As a result, the colleges are becoming less significant and less attractive for academicians.
“If we do not have the right education work, if we do not have the right expertise in research and other things in colleges, we will not get the best.“When that happens, the students will be an improved specie and it will be to the benefit of agriculture in Nigeria generally,” he added. “At the moment, their recurrent budgetary allocation, that is, salaries and wages, is almost 100 per cent. Overhead, which includes travels, seminars and workshops, is between 40 to 60 per cent.
Adamu lamented that besides poor funding, the law establishing the council had been prone to abuse in various ways.