The Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFund) has issued a stern warning to tertiary institutions with abandoned or delayed intervention projects, declaring that any beneficiary institution that fails to complete outstanding projects will be barred from accessing new projects under the Fund’s 2027 intervention cycle.

 

The directive was issued by the Chairman of the Board of Trustees (BoT) of the Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFund), Aminu Masari, following the Board’s review of the persistent delays in the execution of TETFund-sponsored projects across beneficiary institutions.

 

A statement on Wednesday by the Director, Public Affairs of TETFund, Abdulmumin Oniyangi, did not however name the erring institutions.

 

According to the statement, Masari said the Board had taken a final position on the recurring problem, stressing that institutions with projects that have exceeded their completion timelines would first have to clear the backlog before being considered for fresh interventions in 2027.

 

He acknowledged that rising costs of construction materials, including cement, reinforcement bars, sanitary and electrical fittings, had contributed to delays in project execution. To address the challenge, he noted that the Board introduced a special intervention line in 2023 dedicated to completing stalled projects.

 

According to him, the initiative had yielded positive results, with many previously distressed projects now completed.

 

Despite the progress, the BoT Chairman expressed concern over the continued failure of some institutions to adhere to project timelines, blaming the trend largely on discontinuity in project implementation by successive heads of institutions, who often abandon inherited projects in favour of new ones, as well as delays in processing payments to contractors.

 

“The Board will not allow TETFund-sponsored projects to be negatively affected by internal bureaucracy and politics within beneficiary institutions,” he warned.

 

To permanently address the problem of delayed and distressed projects, the Board approved a number of immediate measures for implementation by all beneficiary institutions.

 

Under the new directives, institutions are required to compile comprehensive lists of all projects that have exceeded their planned completion periods by more than six months, clearly stating the causes of the delays and proposed remedies.

 

The institutions must also rank the affected projects according to priority and relevance, accompanied by detailed cost estimates for their completion.

 

The statement directed beneficiary institutions to establish robust project supervision teams involving their Physical Planning and Maintenance Departments to ensure projects are delivered on schedule, within approved costs and to the required quality standards.

 

The Board further directed that institutions with delayed projects must prioritise completing them under their Annual, Zonal and High Impact Intervention lines.

 

“As a consequence, no new projects will be admitted from the identified beneficiary institutions for the 2027 intervention cycle,” Masari stated.

 

To ensure compliance, the BoT will deploy monitoring teams made up of Board members and technical staff to conduct on-the-spot assessments of affected projects and review institutions’ completion plans.

 

The inspections are scheduled to take place between August and September 2026 ahead of the Board’s statutory meeting in October, where projects eligible for inclusion in the 2027 disbursement guidelines will be considered.