3 Kwara colleges stopped from running degree programmes

The three Kwara State-owned Colleges of Education in Ilorin, Oro and Lafiagi have been ordered to immediately discontinue all degree and outreach courses and focus on training of teachers for basic education level, the purpose for which they were established. However, the decision would not affect students who had already been admitted and are currently undertaking such courses in the three institutions.

Briefing journalists on Thursday 6 November on decisions reached at the state Executive Council meeting, the Secretary to the State Government, SSG, Alhaji Isiaka Gold, who lamented that the three colleges had lost focus and bearing, said the enabling laws of the colleges would be reviewed in line with the dynamics of the contemporary world.

Gold, who expressed government’s concern at the allegations of falsification of admission enrolment, unauthorised borrowing, high handed- ness and power tussle among the rank and file of the institutions’ authorities, especially the debt profile of 152million naira hanging on College of Education, Ilorin, said the Executive Council has approved the setting up of committees to unravel the startling discovery, assuring that whoever is found wanting would be made to face the music.

He added that a committee would also be set up to check the appropriateness of the introduction of the IJMB programme in the Colleges of Education in Oro and Lafiagi without losing focus of their primary mandate.

The SSG said the state government was worried about the delay in the take off of the Hydro Power Area Development Commission, HYPPADEC, despite the enactment and signing into law of its Act. In view of the recent flood devastation and un- quantifiable damages suffered by the downstream communities, he said the state government would champion the cause of member states to ensure that governors in the zone impress it on the federal government to facilitate the commission’s take-off before the completion of the on-going process of unbundling the electricity sector.

By Stephen Oni/Ilorin