By Terna Chikpa, Jalingo
The visitation panel to the Taraba State University Jalingo on Thursday said the university is operating below the National University Commission standard, and recommended that the procedure for appointments of the governing council of the university be restructured.
Professor Josiah Kente, chairman of the panel disclosed this while briefing journalists after presenting the report to Governor Agbu Kefas, in Jalingo said the recommendation was based on terms of reference given to the committee considering the leadership quality of the University like the governing council, the Vice chancellor and other principal officers.
According to Kente, the panel discovered that the inappropriate composition and appointment of governing council in the university has affected adversely the policies and direction of the university.
“Base on the data and information given to us by the university management, and considering the committee’s terms of reference on the leadership quality of the university, we recommend the restructuring of the governing council. We discovered that the inappropriate composition and appointment of governing council in the university has affected adversary the policies and direction of the university. The chairman of the governing should be one who has university administration experience, and would be able to advise the institution appropriately.
“The staffing system of the university is not as designed by the NUC. The NUC standard stipulates that the staff system of a university should be 70/30. 70 per cent of academic staff and 30 per cent non academic staff. While in the Taraba State University, it is 70 per cent non academic and 30 per cent academic staff. The university has 749 academic and 1,819 non-academic.
“We also advised the state government to constitute an investigative panel to probe the financial management of the university. We discovered that there is no proper financial record in the institution. The management of the university was unable to provide the financial cash record of the university especially, from 2012- 2016 and 2010- 2023.
“We have even recommended that some persons should return money because, they violated all financial rules of spending in an institution and spend at will.
“The recruitment process in the university is also not done as supposed. The process has to be transparent. The positions has to be sent to the council for approval, and be advertise but all these procedure are not followed during the exercise and we discovered there are lots of improper practice going on in the university.
“We advise the state government under Governor Agbu Kefas to implement the report to make Taraba State University to meet the NUC standard and become a real university,” Prof. Kente disclosed.
