By Joy Odor
The Executive Secretary (ES), Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFund), Sonny Echono has on Friday informed that the Federal Government has approved the sum of N643.4 billion naira as 2024 disbursement for beneficiary tertiary institutions in Nigeria.
Speaking at a Strategic meeting with Heads of beneficiary institutions in Abuja, TETFund Boss noted that each University shall get, for the 2024 intervention cycle, the total sum of N1,906,944,930.00, comprises N1,656,944,930.00 as annual direct disbursement and N250 million as zonal intervention.
Echono explained that each polytechnic shall get N1,165,355,235, also comprising N1,015,355,235 as annual direct disbursement and N150 million as zonal intervention.
He affirmed that each College of Education shall get N1,398,426,282.00, comprising N1,248,426,282.00 as annual direct disbursement and N150 million as zonal intervention.
TETFund Boss pointed out that the disbursement was the highest since inception and attributed the increase to sustained efforts at expanding and increasing the efficiency of education tax collection from 2.5 per cent to 3.0 per cent in 2023.
Echono maintained that the Fund had budgeted 90.57 per cent for direct annual disbursement and 8.4 per cent as designated special interventions from the total disbursement.
He said the approved new intervention lines in the annual direct disbursement included the establishment of career centres and units in all categories of beneficiary institutions, as well as the development of skills for polytechnics.
TETFund Boss said in response to popular demands from the colleges of education, the teaching practice allocation had been greatly enhanced.
“A stabilisation of 2.27 per cent is allowed to enable the use of the fund to respond to emerging issues.
“This is inclusive of the difference between actual collections and the projections made for November and December 2023 collections as requested and approved by President Tinubu.
“For the Special Direct Disbursements, we have increased the allocation for the Special High Impact Programme (SHIP).
“Also, the number of benefiting institutions has also been increased to two per geopolitical zone per category, giving a total of 36 beneficiary institutions.
“Other areas of special direct disbursement are provision for hostels using the public/private partnership arrangement, innovation hubs, disaster recovery, security infrastructure, completion of abandoned projects, and many others,” he added.
Echono advised Heads of beneficiary institutions to make timely payments to contractors and vendors to aid in the proper completion of projects and appealed to them to immediately commence implementation as early as possible.
On the challenges of brain drain in the sector, Echono advocated for increased remuneration for lecturers as a way to keep them rather than them leaving the shores of the country.
He commended the National Assembly and the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) for an increase in education tax collection while hoping they would help in achieving N1 trillion in education collection by the end of 2024.
Earlier, while declaring the meeting open, the Minister of Education, Prof. Tahir Mamman enjoined the unions to serve as watchdogs in monitoring the implementation of the projects at the different institutions and to redouble their efforts to achieve the renewed hope of President Bola Tinubu.
Represented by the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry, Zubairu Abdullahi, Tahir called on the unions to serve as constructive critics of the federal government’s achievements.
In his remark, the Executive Secretary, National Board for Technical Education (NBTE), Prof. Idris Bugaje pleaded for a review of the sharing formula in the disbursement to benefit the polytechnics sector more while commending the federal government for the prompt release of disbursement allocations to beneficiary institutions.
