By Biodun Busari 

Sokoto State Governor, Aminu Tambuwal said his administration has spent N14b billion to award scholarships to 46,000 indigenes in the state from 2016 to 2022.

The governor stated that the beneficiaries of the scholarships were among 77 that successfully graduated with first class degrees in Indian tertiary institutions.

The News Agency of Nigeria reported that Tambuwal’s spokesman, Muhammad Bello, disclosed this in a statement on Saturday, adding that medical doctors, engineers and lawyers have emerged from them. 

Read also: Group lauds Tambuwal on health, education reforms in Sokoto

According to Bello, one of the graduates, Hassan Usman from Kofa village in Binji Local Government Area, become the recipient of the first African silver medal for outstanding performance in Bio-Medical Engineering.

He said another student, Muzammil Maidoki, from Sokoto North LGA, who while pursuing his study also memorized the Holy Qur’an and Sahih Bukhari, graduated with a first class degree in Medicine from Nahda University in Sudan.

“All the students were products of a scholarship scheme bankrolled by the state government, which has expended the sum of N14 billion between 2016 and 2022 on the training of 46,000 indigenous students as medical doctors, engineers and other professionals.

“The graduates were presented to Gov. Tambuwal, on Friday in Sokoto by the Permanent Secretary in the state scholarship board, Alhaji Bello Isah,” Bello said.

He said Tambuwal, while receiving the graduates, directed the state’s Head of Service to ensure that all the medical graduates were immediately employed after completing their mandatory youths service scheme.

Bello added that Tambuwal expressed his delight with their academic feats, awarded the silver medalist a scholarship to pursue his master’s degree and PhD.

NAN said according to the governor’s media aide, Tambuwal’s administration’s huge investment in medical students is aimed at addressing the lack of adequate manpower in the state’s health sector.

“We know our challenges. We do not have adequate medical manpower.

“This is the reason why we came up with this programme so that we can have enough manpower for our people, especially now that we are building more hospitals in the state,” he said.

Earlier the Permanent Secretary of the state scholarship board, explained that 1,121 students were trained in medicine, engineering and other paramedic courses from universities in India, Sudan, Ukraine and Ghana.

He added that 15,000 of those sponsored were graduates of sciences and social sciences related courses from different universities in Nigeria, among them were 300 lawyers.

Isah further said that an additional 30,000 are currently being sponsored to study various courses in Nigeria.