Attahiru Jega Gets New Federal Appointment

A former chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission, (INEC), Prof Attahiru Jega, has been appointed by the federal government as part of those to review the university system of Nigeria.

Also appointed alongside Jega is a past executive secretary of the National Universities Commission (NUC) Prof Peter Okebukola, the Punch reports.

The appointments were disclosed by the executive secretary of NUC, Prof Abubakar Rasheed, in an interview with journalists in Abuja on Monday, January 8, shortly after he appeared before the Senate committee on Tertiary Institutions and TETFUND to defend the 2018 budget proposed by the commission.

He said: “The NUC has constituted a high-powered committee of very credible senior academics.

“Most of the members of this small committee are former vice chancellors, former executive secretaries of the NUC and some had held positions like pro-chancellor, chairman of INEC and minister of education.

“We have given them a six-term reference to help us with the re-positioning of Nigeria’s university system.”

The NUC also described the recent rating of tertiary institutions allegedly done by it as fake.

It said it has not rated tertiary institutions in the country for many years.

Meanwhile, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has been urged by the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) to release its findings on the alleged N2 billion fraud at the University of Ilorin, The Guardian reports.

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ASUU made its position public in a statement titled: Impunity and disregard for the rule of law: the cases of the University of Ilorin, Kogi State University and the Lagos State University.

NAIJ.com gathers that the academic union chided the EFCC, the Code of Conduct Bureau (CCB) and the Independent Corruption and other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) for failing to take appropriate action in the case.

ASUU lamented over the fact that despite that the petitions which allegedly indicted Prof Ishaq Oloyede and Prof Abdulganiyu Ambali as Vice Chancellors of the institution, the anti-corruption agencies had not prosecuted them.