Gom Mirian
In a bid to address the persistent issue of power outages in Nigerian universities and other tertiary institutions, the Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFund) has announced its readiness to collaborate with the Rural Electrification Agency (REA) to ensure uninterrupted power supply to educational institutions across the country.
Speaking when a delegation from REA paid him a courtesy visit in his office in Abuja on Tuesday, the Executive Secretary of TETFund, Arc. Sonny Echono, expressed his organisation’s commitment to improving the quality of education in Nigeria. He emphasised the importance of reliable electricity supply in enhancing learning environments, facilitating research and development activities.
Arc. Echono acknowledged the contribution of REA in electrifying rural areas and expressed optimism that the partnership would have positive impact on tertiary institutions. He stated, “There is sheer acceptance that this is important for us as we move to improve not just the physical infrastructure, but also ICT infrastructure and research infrastructure in our institutions.
“A lot of these require constant supply of power. There are certain samples you must put at a certain temperature for a prolonged period. There are certain operations you do in a medical laboratory that you cannot afford power to cease even for a second and if we want to guarantee a learning environment that can compete with others across the globe, one of the primary things we can do is to guarantee power in our campuses,” Echono said.
While urging REA to revamp the project in some of the beneficiary institutions that have encountered challenges with the Energising Education Programme (EEP), Echono said TETFund would explore the possibility of getting longer-term financing from the African Development Bank (AfDB) for subsequent editions of the scheme.
The Managing Director of REA, Salihijo Ahmad, who said EEP is aimed at providing sustainable and clean power supply to 37 Federal Universities and seven university teaching hospitals across the country, stated that the programme has already commenced in 24 universities and select teaching hospitals.
He said: “Infrastructure is not just about classrooms and lecture theatres, with the current situation in the country, it is becoming more apparent that we have a decentralised power system. They are very important for our institutions like universities.”
Additional resources for the EEP from TETFund would go a long way to scale up the programme, he added.
