By Dayo Adesulu

THE Federal Government has been urged to reduce the criteria given to universities for accessing the Tertiary Education Trust Fund, TETfund which runs to billions of naira lying fallow in the bank due to stringent pre-requisite outlined for possession.

This is even as the authorities of TETFund have been accused of favouritism in release of the fund, alleging that while some of the funds are being released to the Northern universities, their Southern counterparts are being denied the same.

Professor Ibiyemi Olatunji-Bello, who disclosed this in an interview with journalists during the 7th International Congress of African Association of Physiological Sciences and 36th PSN Scientific Conference held in Lagos said: “  TETFund that is meant to be released to public  universities  to enhance  quality  research  and  productivity, is neglected  owing  to bottlenecks that hinder us from accessing these funds.”

According to her, government  should review the criteria  for  accessing  the  fund else the funds  will  continue to lie wasted and quality of education will be affected.

She said: “Others are  getting  the  fund. We are not getting it, because there are so many  things required by  TETfund that  are not available to  universities and nobody wants to do anything illegal.

“So, the best thing is, if they are asking for these things and we do not have it, let us just stay away and that is why most universities are not able to access this TETFund.

“But,  some  universities seem to be accessing it, mostly in the north, but down south we are not getting much of it.”

Olatunji-Bello who was the Chairman, Local Organizing   Committee for the congress lamented the state of medical equipment in our universities, adding that while some of them are outdated, some vital equipment are non-existent  in the universities.

She, however posited that government cannot completely fund education, especially tertiary education. According to her, while government is trying to give what they can, tertiary institutions should endeavour, through their advancement units, go ahead and solicit for fund to support what government is doing.

“We have the great challenge of carrying out research because of the poor state of technology  and    infrastructure, “  she  said.

She explained that to put the world conference together, AAPS got support from  International Physiological Societies, the International Union of Physiological Sciences(IUPS), the American Physiological Society, the Physiological Society of Great Britain and the Lagos State government that started off the encouragement.

Speaking on benefits of science to all countries globally, the President of IUPS, Professor Denis Noble, said that advances in technology and science bring people out of poverty to raise the standard of living and   improve health care among its citizenry.

He noted that Nigeria’s hosting the congress will help create the process by which it can improve in social-life, in standard of living, and in health care, adding, “All of those things flow from the development of science and technology.”

Nobel further said that the conference will address the big challenge for the physiological sciences and what makes life.

On his part, the President of Physiological Society of Nigeria(PSN), Professor Arthur Nwafor said that at the end of the conference, it would have addressed the challenges in technical training, stressing that we need that technical training, just as  people from outside the country will come to Nigeria to teach us what to do.

He, also pointed out that the conference will provide the acquire instruments which we lack to educate our people in Nigeria.

On research, he said: “With the little income we have, we have been doing quality. We pray that the the government should support us in this area because, without research in Physiology, your health is in danger. So Physiology is the medicine we are talking about, without funding there will be no health.”