The Supervising Minister of Education, Chief Nyesom Wike, on Monday presented letters of allocation for the N200 billion intervention fund to all public universities in the country.
Wike, who made the presentation at a meeting with vice chancellors of the universities in Abuja, urged the beneficiary institutions to utilise the funds and take them to the desired level.
He noted that the Federal Government was committed to improving university education in the country, and tasked the vice chancellors to ensure that the funds were used to improve infrastructure in their universities.
While expressing the hope that the money would be utilised within the year, Wike said government would start to render public account of what tertiary institutions did from next month.
He said all the institutions would account for the funds allocated to them, and let the people know what the government was doing to improve the education sector.
Wike said it was imperative that the public knew how much government was investing in tertiary education, and correct the impression that it was neglecting the sector.
He said that the exercise would be conducted in the six geopolitical zones of the country, beginning from March 4 with the North-Central Zone at the Federal College of Agriculture, Makurdi.
He said that the South-East zone would converge at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, on March 11, while the session in the South-South zone would be at the University of Port Harcourt on March 10.
Wike said that the Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, would host the North-West zone, while the South-West zone would hold at the University of Ibadan on a date to be announced.
Wike urged the institutions not to see the exercise as an audit of their financial expenditure, but a public sensitisation programme on what they were doing to revitalise the tertiary education sector.
He said that the events would be transmitted live on the media, to show the sincerity of government, and how the funds were utilised by the various institutions.
It would be recalled that the federal government, in a bid to end the protracted strike by ASUU in 2013, approved a N200 billion increase in university funding in the 2014 budget.
The increment, according to the government, would continue for the next four years until the universities meet world standards. (NAN)
