TINUBU APPROVES N683 BILLION AS 2024 INTERVENTION FUND FOR PUBLIC TERTIARY SCHOOLS

Read Time:1 Minute, 23 Second

President Bola Tinubu has authorised N683,429,268 billion as the 2024 intervention fund for public tertiary colleges in the country.

The Executive Secretary of the Tertiary Education Trust Fund, TETFund, Sonny Echono, made this remark on Friday at the Fund’s strategic planning meeting with heads of beneficiary institutions in Abuja.

He claims that of the total, 90.75% is set aside for direct payments, 8.94% for specific projects that have been designated, and 2.27 percent is budgeted for responding to new problems.

Additionally, he revealed that the total amount allotted to universities for the 2024 intervention cycle is N1,906,944,930.00 for polytechnic universities and N1,165,355,235.00 for colleges of education.

The intervention fund is anticipated to have a significant impact on addressing the long-standing, decades-long demands for increased education funding in Nigeria. Strikes have been a common tactic used by lecturers in the nation’s public schools to press for their goals, which also included more compensation and better facilities for educational institutions.

University professors in the most populous country in Africa called off an eight-month protest in late 2022 over issues of pay, welfare, and dilapidated facilities.

Despite negotiations for a ceasefire with the government, the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) strike has closed federally controlled universities since February 14 of that year.

ASUU, a union notorious for its work stoppages, called that strike its second longest. During the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, university instructors embarked on a nine-month strike.

Similar to past strikes, the professors’ requests are for a greater salary, better welfare, more financing, and better facilities.