Poor funding responsible for crisis in tertiary institutions, says REC

Imo State Resident Electoral Commissioner, Prof. Francis Ezeonu has identified poor funding, poor management and remuneration of teachers as major causes of conflict and disorder in tertiary institutions.

He added that the ugly trend has contributed to students’ restiveness, addiction to harmful substances, stressing that it has become imperative that managers of students find solutions to the problems before it gets out of hand.

Ezeonu stated this during the 2nd Annual Conference of the Association of Deans of Student Affairs in Tertiary Institutions in Nigeria (ADOSATI) held at Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka. Speaking on the theme, “Sustainable Peace Building and Crisis Management on our Campuses” the INEC Commissioner said poor welfare, inadequate hostels and classroom accommodation leading to congestion, poor transportation, inadequate water supply, poor health facilities, epileptic power, extortion, bureaucratic bottlenecks, dictatorial style of administration by vice chancellors among others were contributing to conflict in the tertiary institutions.

“There is too much emphasis on paper qualification in Nigeria, rather than knowledge, skill and competence. Most students have requisite knowledge, skill and competence, but lack the ability to reproduce what the teacher taught.

“This anomalies frustrate most students to the level of taking solace in bribing lecturers for marks, while the female among them resort to offering sexual gratification to lecturers, just to acquire certificates, thereby abandoning the skills and competence they earlier acquired”, he said.

Ezeonu condemned the growing cases of drug addiction among students, calling on the association to dedicate part of its three-day conference to map out strategies of nipping the trend in the bud.

He further said that improving funding, providing teaching and learning materials, ensuring proper consultation with stakeholders as well as encouraging private partnership in running institutions were panacea for mitigating conflicts.

President of the association, Prof. Stanley Udedi, said the situation of Nigerian students was compounded by an increased uncertainty over the future.

Providing evidence to the assertion, he noted that it was meaningful to take into account the steady rise of youth unemployment, which he said has adversely affected students’ performance. He posited that the conference was expected to proffer solutions to the myriad of challenges bedeviling the institutions.