The Tertiary Education Trust Fund, TETFUND has released about ₦100 billion to some selected tertiary institutions across the country to expand training of medical scientists and address the shortage of healthcare professionals in the country. Chairman of the TETFUND Governing Board, Aminu Masari, disclosed this in Katsina on Saturday, saying it is part of President Bola Tinubu’s renewed hope agenda to reverse the brain drain in the health sector that has been affecting the country in the form of ‘japa syndrome’.
He said, “The President is particularly worried by the trend and how it is affecting the Nigerian healthcare system and wants to institute measures in place to enable the healthcare system to recover through deliberate policies such as this ongoing intervention by TETFUND.”
According to Masari, three tertiary institutions in each geopolitical zone would benefit from the sum of ₦4 billion to execute various projects and expand their academic scope in boosting their capacity to accommodate and train more students in medical fields.
The chairman said, “The aim is to double the number of doctors, nurses, pharmacists, laboratory technicians and other skilled professionals in the healthcare system; this will no doubt enhance healthcare delivery in the country.
“Every fiscal year, TETFUND carries out interventions at state and zonal levels, but because we have to spread our impact throughout the country, this medical sciences project is TETFUND’s high-impact intervention for 2025,” Masari added.
Masari said the Fund has a monitoring and evaluation team that comprises consultants who go round all the benefitting tertiary institutions to ensure that all the monies budgeted are spent on the specific projects and programs for which they are meant for.
The former Katsina State governor explained that the 2025 allocation marks TETFUND’s highest grant yet, ₦1.6 trillion, which was generated from the 3% education tax on company profits as stipulated by the TETFUND Act.
He revealed that ₦460 billion was earmarked for various intervention programs across tertiary institutions.
Of the three institutions selected in each state, one university, one Polytechnic, and one College of Education will benefit from the intervention.
Although, he noted that “The interventions are based on demand; the institutions write to us, and we select and approve projects for them based on their needs and based on the resources available.”
According to Masari, of the N1.65 trillion of TETFUND money, N225 billion was disbursed to the Nigerian Education Loan Fund for the Federal Government’s student loan initiative.
He added another N70 billion was billed for energy support to tertiary institutions to build solar or gas power generation facilities.
Meanwhile, the Governing Board also announced that the Agency has also made provision of N25 billion for the provision of security in some selected tertiary institutions in the form of security lights and other forms of physical security.