President Goodluck Jonathan President Goodluck Jonathan has said his administration remains committed to various agreements and undertakings reached with various unions, associations and other stakeholders in the educational system. Speaking at the recent 19th and 20th convocation ceremonies of the University of Uyo, Nigeria, the President said fulfilling those agreements is towards a holistic realisation of the goal of stemming the tide of brain drain and enhancing the quality and quantity of educational products in the country. President Jonathan, who is a Visitor to the University, was represented at the events by the former Vice Chancellor, Abubakar Tafawa Balewa University, Bauchi, Prof. Hamisu Mohammed. He said no nation can rise above the level of its educational development; hence the commitment to working towards reversing the trend, which has been bane of the neglect in the education sector over the years. The President said with conviction that with continued cooperation of the unions and other stakeholders in the education sector, the trend would be reversed for the good of the nation. “In addition to stepping up the budgetary allocations to education to address the inadequacies in our institutions, we will continue to ensure that the interventionist bodies such as the Petroleum Training Development Fund (PTDF) and the Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFUND) continue to render their services to the sector effectively without interference. The President said problems of inadequate student accommodation, staff offices, laboratories facilities and lack of infrastructures, libraries, seminar rooms, lecture theatres, and intra-campus road network, had been in the front burner of his administration’s derive towards bringing universities to globally competitive standards. He pointed out that as part of the efforts to address those problems, the federal government had already committed substantial amount of N200 billion to revitalise the public universities through the NEEDS Assessment Projects to support teaching, learning and research. The President expressed optimism that by this time next year, all those enumerated challenges shall no longer exist in universities again. Accordingly, he tasked universities to make creative research their priority and continue to provide answers to the problems of the society. “The search for knowledge and its application for the development of new products and services and for the resolution of the challenges confronting our immediate environment should constitute the core of their activities. Indeed, the time has come for us to pursue aggressive and creative research if we are to obtain a competitive edge and rise to the top of the global economy”, the President stressed.
Posted on: Sun, 30 Nov 2014 05:56:37 +0000
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