The Governor of Oyo State, Senator Abiola Ajimobi, and his Osun State counterpart, Mr. Rauf Aregbesola, have lamented the non-resumption of academic activities at the Ladoke Akintola University of Technology, Ogbomoso, Oyo State.
The state governors bared their minds during the submission of the report of the Chief Wole Olanipekun (SAN)-led panel, set up over the crisis rocking the university, at the Governor’s Office, Ibadan, on Friday.
The panel was set up in October 2016 towards charting a fresh path for the institution, which had been experiencing funding crisis, a situation that led to the closure of the school for more than eight months.
Although the school was reopened by the management on January 27, 2017 following the injection of about N500m by the two owner states, the institution’s branch of the Academic Staff Union of Universities has yet to return to classes, citing unresolved issues with the management.
Ajimobi said, “Oyo State that used to get N5.2bn as monthly allocation now gets as low as N2.5bn and we have to pay salaries of workers and finance social infrastructure. How do we survive that without looking inwards?
“The reality on the ground requires that we look at different ways of doing things. There is need for repositioning the university, especially on the structure. The non-resumption of academic activities after all our efforts is worrying. LAUTECH should be the flagship institution of the South-West.”
Aregbesola also lamented the refusal of lecturers to return to classes, saying that the school’s crisis was regrettable, but inevitable due to a sharp drop in the states’ financial powers as caused by dwindling oil fortunes.
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