Bauchi State Commissioner for Education, Dr. Aliyu Tilde has argued that improving the nomadic education system will curb banditry in the country.

In a statement he issued shortly after he was sworn in again as education commissioner, Tilde said nomadic education has suffered neglect in the past, thus, would be the state’s priority.

The commissioner said he has met with the Executive Secretary of the National Commission for Nomadic Education (NCNE), Professor Bashir Usman, who assured him of the commission’s support.

“The statistics are clear. In the past five years, only seven projects were carried out under Bauchi State Agency for Nomadic Education (BASANE), touching on only seven out of 463 primary schools, three of which were carried out by NCNE. To put it straight, the 463 schools have been abandoned for years. Is it surprising that we have bandits and kidnappers below the age of 30 from our forests?

“Are these schools not part of the basic schools’ count that are entitled to the attention that other similar schools get? Fortunately, I have cleared the matter with the executive secretary of the Universal Basic Education Commission in Abuja a day before. These schools deserve to be treated as other schools,” Tilde said.

He promised to involve all stakeholders in the state, saying, that as clerics continue with their efforts to take religious education to the nomads, the government needs to retrace its steps and pay due attention to the rights and plight of the nomads. “Education is the only tool for their refinement and integration into the larger civilization,” he said.

The Gombe government has assisted indigenes of the state studying in various campuses of the Nigerian Law School with laptops and cash worth about N33 million to aid them in settling their academic fees for better performance.

Making the presentations recently at the Ministry of Justice conference hall, Governor Muhammadu Yahaya said his administration would continue to provide the needed atmosphere and support for excellence towards achieving the needed target of improved capacity, efficiency, and quality education.

Yahaya, represented by the Deputy Governor, Dr. Manassah Jatau, said the provision of laptops and cash was to encourage students at Law School to build their educational capacity to prepare them for a better professional practice.

Speaking earlier, the Commissioner for Justice and Attorney General, Zubair Muhammad Umar, said N370,000 was presented to 61 indigenes in six campuses of the Law School.

He said the gesture was a demonstration of the commitment of the Yahaya-led administration to the people of the state, calling on the students to justify the government’s investment in them by performing well.

Speaking on behalf of the recipients, the National Chairman of the Association of Law Students, Gombe Chapter, Idris Mohammed, thanked the government for the assistance and pledged to justify their spending.

The wife of the Bauchi State Governor, Hajiya Aisha Bala Mohammed, has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the University of Maiduguri and Kaduna Polytechnic on entrepreneurship education.

While signing the MoU with Almuhibba Institute, which she founded, she stated that the institute is affiliated with the two institutions to award diploma and postgraduate education.

The governor’s wife said education should be the priority of every human being, pointing out that whosoever wants to be wealthy and become a leader must become educated.

She said, “We have recognised the potential of the university and the Kaduna Polytechnic, which are fully entrenched in entrepreneurship development. Therefore, we felt the need to associate with them and add value in creating future entrepreneurs.

The signing of this MoU with Almuhibba Institute is aimed at nurturing the students for their future endeavours and promote entrepreneurship culture among the youth of Bauchi State and Nigeria.”

In their separate remarks, the Vice-Chancellor University of Maiduguri, represented by Dr. Sheriff Umar and the Rector of Kaduna Polytechnic, represented by Dr. Nasiru Bello, Head of Kaduna Polytechnic Consultancy Services expressed delight on the official signing of the MoU and encouraged the institute to ensure that it activates the MoU

“For us, teaching entrepreneurship has been one of the core components in our entire curriculum because we want to train students to make a difference in their lives through skill knowledge and value-based education,” Sheriff said.

Representatives of tertiary institutions in Bauchi witnessed the occasion.

The Yola zone of the Academic Staff Union of University (ASUU) has called on the public to prevail on the federal and state governments to comply to union’s legitimate demands to avoid the resumption of the suspended strike.

Zonal Coordinator , Reuben Jonathan, who made the call at a news conference  in Yola, said the zone had met and reviewed the MoA of 23rd December, 2020 signed with the Federal government; the issues related to the draft renegotiation agreement of May, 2021 and other matters affecting the university system generally.

According to him, the zone appreciated the Federal Government’s action in sending visitation panels to public universities.

 “However, the zone expects the speedy release of the whitepaper of visitation panels to the universities for the benefit of the university system”, he said.

He called on the state governors, as visitors to state universities, to also emulate the federal government and immediately constitute visitation panels to state-owned universities.

“The Federal Government Team and ASUU concluded the renegotiation meeting in May, 2021 but up till now our Union is in dark as to the position of the renegotiation with the Federal Government.

 “This lukewarm attitude and deliberate delay has triggered agitations from our members”, he said.

Jonathan added, “While funding in Nigerian public universities is grossly inadequate, the situation is most worrisome in state-owned universities”.

“The inefficiency and over-reliance on the federal government’s interventions by state-owned universities, emanating from ASUU struggles, have led the state governors to develop a lukewarm attitude towards funding state universities”.

The Zonal coordinator further expressed concern over the non-disbursement of the N30 billion naira revitalization fund as agreed in the 2020 MoA with the union.

Vice-Chancellor, Osun State University, Professor Labo Popoola said his development plan for the school was slowed down by a crisis that engulfed it for the first two years of his administration.

Addressing a press conference to herald the 10th convocation of the university at the multi-purpose hall, in the main campus in Osogbo, Professor Popoola said his five years development agenda for the school was hindered by union crisis, adding that meaningful result was achieved within the last three years of his leadership.

“I am not satisfied with the achievements of the university within the last five years. We intend to achieve a lot but the first two years of our administration was turbulent a very unnecessary crisis. We did a lot but we could have achieved much more if there was no crisis.

“We built six 104 rooms hostels, one per campus, built more lecture theatre, built a multi-disciplinary laboratory, we got more professional accredited courses and move from 37th to 29th ranked university in the country within the period. All of these were done in under three years. We could have done more without the unnecessary crisis”, he said.

Speaking on the 10th convocation ceremony, the Vice-Chancellor said 1,815 graduands would be conferred with first degrees across the colleges out of which only 35 had first class. Two hundred and six (206) postgraduate degree and Diploma graduands will also be conferred with Postgraduate Degrees and Diplomas.

“Also, five hundred and forty-four (544)  representing 29.97% of the total number of graduands will be awarded Second Class (Upper) degrees, nine hundred and thirty-seven (937) representing 51.63% of the total number of graduands made Second Class (Lower), two hundred and eighty-nine (289) representing 15.92% of the total number of graduands made a Third Class (lower), while ten (10) graduands representing 0.55% of the total number of graduands will be awarded the pass degrees in different programmes.

“This will bring the total number of first degrees awarded by the University since its first graduation to thirteen thousand eight hundred and fifty-six (13, 856).

“Under the Postgraduate graduands, we have one hundred and sixty-nine (169) Academic Masters, sixteen (16) Professional Masters’, and twenty-one (21 Postgraduate Diploma graduands from different programmes spread across the 12 faculties in the University.

“To ensure that every graduand is accorded the opportunity to be part of this 10th convocation ceremony, we had commenced the distribution of convocation kits to the respective addresses of our graduands, including graduands who have been mobilized for the National Youth Service.

 Graduands who would not be opportune to join physically can also be part of the ceremonies virtually”, he said.

Prof. Ibiyemi Olatunji-Bello, wife of the Lagos state commissioner for environment and water resources, Tunji bello has been named the ninth substantive vice chancellor of the lagos state university (LASU).

A statement by the state government said Governor Babajide Olusola-Sanwo-Olu approved the appointment.

The statement signed by the state commissioner for information and strategy, Gbenga Omotoso, said Professor Olatunji-Bello was appointed following recommendation by the joint committee of council and senate of LASU in accordance with theLASU law, cap 169 vol 7, laws of lagos state.

Olatunj-Bello assumed duty as the First Professor of Physiology in LASU College of Medicine on the 2nd of October 2007 after rising through the ranks from Assistant Lecturer (1988 to 1991) to Associate Professor in 2005 at the College of Medicine, University of Lagos, Idi-Araba.

In year 2012, Prof. Olatunji-Bello attended the Course 34 of the National Institute of Policy and Strategic Studies, Kuru, the highest policy advisory body of the Federal Government, as a nominee of the National Universities Commission.

A member of the National Institute (MNI), Mrs. Olatunji-Bello holds a Fellowship Award of the Physiological Society of Nigeria and was also appointed a Fellow of the Environmental Toxicology and Pollution Mitigation in the year 2019.

Prof. Olatunji-Bello as well as two other candidates, Professor Omotayo R. Awofolu and Professor Senapon Bakare, were recommended for the position in order of ranking respectively.

The process of selecting a substantive Vice-Chancellor for LASU commenced with advertisements for the vacant position in three National dailies on Friday, July 30th and Friday 13th August, 2021 respectively.

The tenure of the 8th substantive Vice-Chancellor of the University, Professor Olanrewaju Adigun Fagbohun, lapsed on January 11, 2021.