Fashola Writes Assembly Over Increase In Budget
The Lagos State Governor, Babatunde Fashola, has jacked up the 2011 budget proposal sent to the State House of Assembly in December last year from N445.1 billion to N448.202.
This, the governor said, was to put the state university, LASU, which has been in crisis since last year, in shape again for academic activities
In a letter he sent to the House last Monday, Governor Fashola said when he presented the N455 billion appropriation bill to the House on 14 December, 2010, a committee was still working with the university’s management to find solutions to the problems facing it.
“At the last accreditation exercise conducted by the NUC, out of the 68 academic programmes offered by the university, 38 were fully accredited, three had interim accreditation, 17 were not yet matured for accreditation while 10 were denied accreditation.
“Re-presentation of academic programmes for accreditation was due in November last year but could not be carried out because the academic staff of the institution were on industrial action. The NUC has also decided to commence accreditation of institutions, not just programmes, for 2011, while that of LASU is scheduled to take place in March, 2011,†the Governor said in the letter.
He said the NUC has 38 programmes for accreditation while the Council for Registered Engineers of Nigeria (COREN), Council for Legal Education (CLE), and the Town Planners Registration Council (TPRC) also have programmes for accreditation in the institution.
The governor while informing the House that the state government has agreed to pay the federal government-approved universities salary structure, added that the institution’s subvention would be increased to cover a 25 per cent salary increase while the balance is to be covered by LASU through its internally generated revenue.
Fashola also said part of the amount would be used to build more libraries, university secondary school, and school of transportation, a health centre and two lecture theatres.
The letter was thereafter sent to the House Committee on Budget for consideration.
Comments