The Technical University, Ibadan has been renamed The First Technical University, Ibadan.
This followed the passage into law of an amendment to the 2012 law setting up the Technical University, Ibadan, by the Oyo House of Assembly, on Tuesday, presided over by its Speaker, Honourable Olagunju Ojo.
The report as presented by Deputy Speaker of the Assembly, Honourable Abdulwasi Musah, on behalf of the committee of the whole house, the amendment was to affirm that the university was the first of its kind in Africa, was a public university owned by the Oyo state government and it allowed for multi-campus operation.
Other amendments to the bill are that school is to be funded through the grant received from the state government as well as from other public or private sources.
In light of this, the governing council of the institution can solicit and invite private partners to invest in the university, its programmes and objectives.
The section 15, subsection 3(2b) of the principal law amended states, “Any such partnership, collaboration or engagement with private sector partners may be fully or partly owned and operated by such collaborating party but shall be in furtherance of the overall objectives of the university.”
Chairman, House Committee on Information and Security, who provided further clarifications on the amendments said, “We were made to realize that just like we see Oyo state as a pacesetter, the state is also making a landmark in the history of higher institutions in Nigeria because the technical university is different from University of Technology and is the first in Africa.
“Just like we have First bank as the first to be established in Nigeria, the Head of the administration of the university while meeting with a committee of the whole house, convinced us that technical university, Ibadan, is the first in Africa, and that other universities called technical university did not start like that but only transformed into a technical university. So, it is the christened first technical university is because it is the first of the kind to start with the status of a technical university.”
(Nigerian Tribune)
