Olufemi Adediran 
The Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETfund), has donated projects worth over N2 billion to the Federal University of Agriculture Abeokuta (FUNAAB), Tai Solarin College of Education (TASCE), and the Federal College of Education (FCE), all in Ogun state.
The projects include blocks of classrooms, office complexes, an E-library, information centres, a students’ guidance and counseling centre, and a 250-seater auditorium.
Commissioning the projects on Friday, the Chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, Senator Olamilekan Adeola said his committee has commissioned over 76 TETFund sponsored projects in 17 beneficiary institutions across 11 states of the federation.
Adeola who was represented by a former Commissioner for Agriculture in Ogun state, Prof. Tope Popoola assured that the 10th Senate will continue to support TETFUND to advance tertiary education through the enactment of laws.
According to Adeola, the projects donated to FUNAAB at N1.1bn, while the projects built at TASCE cost N1bn, and the projects at FCE gulped N484 million.
The Senator assured that the 10th Senate will continue to support TETFUND to advance tertiary education through the enactment of legislation.
“I wish to reiterate that the National Assembly would continue to work harmoniously with the Executive towards making our educational institutions globally competitive for the economic and technological development of the country.
“I, therefore, wish to use this opportunity to assure you that the 10th Senate under the leadership of the Senate President, Distinguished Senator Godswill Akpabio, and indeed, the entire National Assembly will continue to provide necessary support to the Fund through the enactment of legislations that would further advance tertiary education in Nigeria”, Adeola added.
In his remark, Executive Secretary of TETFund, Arc. Sonny Echono stated that FUNAAB has received allocations up to N8,759,098,751.25 for infrastructure-related interventions since the commencement of the Fund’s interventions to the institution in 2009.
The Executive Secretary who was represented by Arc. Babatunde Olajide, Director, Monitoring and Evaluation, also noted that 91.6 percent of the funds have been accessed and deployed to address infrastructural deficiencies in the university.
He said “The statistics reveal that about 91.6% of these funds have been accessed and deployed to address infrastructural deficiencies in the university. We do not doubt that the projects undertaken with these funds have remarkably impacted the mandate of the university in facilitating teaching,
“Our resolve as a Fund is to ensure that our interventions are sustained and improved upon as much as possible to enable our institutions to undertake bigger, more laudable, and impactful projects that will make them become globally
competitive.”
The FUNAAB Vice Chancellor, Prof Olusola Kehinde applauded the TETfund for the donation, saying those resources would be used for developmental purposes.
Kehinde who was represented by the Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Development), Prof Kolawole Adebayo, said “FUNAAB has fully utilised the allocations that were given and to a large extent we have used it judiciously to the extent that we are now qualified for greater things from the TETfund.”
