Kwara State Governor Extols TETFund on Interventions …Seeks Support to Upgrade Three Colleges of Education

Governor Abdulrahman Abdulrazaq of Kwara State has commended the Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFund) for its laudable intervention in public tertiary educational institutions in Kwara State and other parts of the country.

The Governor gave the commendation when he led some serving members of the National Assembly from Kwara State on a courtesy visit to the Funds’ Headquarter in Abuja, while also imploring the agency not to rest on its laurels but continue building on the successes recorded to date.

Speaking on the purpose of his visit, the Governor disclosed that the state was in the process of upgrading three of its Colleges of Education to Universities of Education and solicited the support of the Fund for the conversion

He stated that the three colleges are Kwara State College of Education, Oro; Kwara State College of Education (Technical), Lafiagi and Kwara State College of Education, Ilorin.

“This visit is to say you are doing a good job and on behalf of the people and government of Kwara State, we say thank you for the job you have done and we appreciate you.

“But we need more support. We intend to convert all our colleges of education to a university of education and so we need your assistance to do that. It is easy to do that because the structures are there,” he stated.

Governor Abdulrasaq also requested for the Fund’s assistance to tackle the challenges of insecurity and water sanitation in tertiary institutions in the state.

In response, the Executive Secretary of TETFund, Arc. Sonny Echono commended Kwara State for the leading role it has played in educational development in Northern Nigeria, which he said, reflected even in the number of institutions in the state.

He assured that the Fund would continue to partner and support the state government even in its plans to convert its colleges of education to universities of education.

Commenting on the Governor’s request for support in the area of security, the Executive Secretary revealed that the Fund has been engaging with the Federal Ministry of Education and others to ensure safe education for Nigerian students.

He also revealed that the Fund was already upgrading security infrastructure in its Beneficiary Institutions and looking at all the various areas of security.

“On our end, we introduced a new intervention line last year where we try to upgrade security facilities in our Beneficiary Institutions. We are doing something about it and Kwara will be featured in that equation,” he assured.