By Peter Duru, Makurdi

The Joseph Sarwuarn Tarka University, Makurdi, JoSTM, formally Federal University of Agriculture Makurdi, FUAM would Saturday confer degrees on a total of 22,027 graduands with over 200 of them bagging First Class.

The Vice Chancellor of the University, Prof. Isaac Itodo made this known Thurday
during the pre-convocation media briefing of the 26th to 31st Combined Convocation Ceremonies of the institution.

Prof. Itodo explained that of the figure “15,402 would be conferred with Bachelors Degree with over 200 of them earning First Class, 4,504 of the graduands would bag Post Graduate Diplomas, 446 would receive Masters Degrees, 2,121 Sandwich degrees and 446 would be conferred PhD Degrees.”

The Vice Chancellor who reeled out some of his achievements since assumption of office as the seventh Vice Chanacellor on February 23, 2023 noted the several reforms his administration initiated and the new courses the institution introduced as well as the unbundled and bifurcation of programmes that had made the institution a major attraction for those seeking academic excellence.

While stating that he had been able to tackle the issue of backlog of students waiting to be mobilised for NYSC due to untimely processing and management of results, Prof Itodo said “in the last two years, Senate has approved these outstanding results and over 9,000 students have been mobilised for the NYSC scheme.”

He noted that “one of the ways of measuring the academic vibrancy of a university is by the number of her Inaugural Lectures in relation to her age. I commenced my tenure with the 36th Inaugural lecture. This translates to a poor standing of less than one lecture in a year for a university that was 43 years old.

Other universities of our age have an average of two to three lectures per year of their age. 32 Inaugural Lectures have been held since my appointment two years ago. I commenced with one lecture per month
throughout 2023 and have now increased it to two lectures per month since 2024. The 67th Inaugural Lecture was held yesterday, March, 26, 2025. Hopefully, the 88th Inaugural Lecture will be held in December, 2025.”

According to the Vice Chancellor, “the university now promptly pay her External Examiners and External Assessors. I am glad to report that the university won 42 National Research Fund of the Tertiary Education Trust Fund, TETfund, in the last year. The Directorate of Research and Innovation has been mandated to ensure that this university wins more this year.

“A snapshot of the infrastructural development undertaken by this administration shows that the university is currently involved in many projects out of which many have been completed, some are ongoing, some are about to commence and one is awaiting commencement of work. The university was able, for the first time in her history, to attract the TETfund High Impact Intervention of N2billion as Special Agriculture Intervention in 2023 and another N4billion in 2024.”

While noting the security challenges confronting the institution, Prof. Itodo said  “the University is currently facing security challenges of kidnapping of our students, invasion by herdsmen and daily pilferage of university properties, particularly armoured cables.

“Most of these challenges can be eliminated with a perimeter fence around the University. The University campus is about 8,000 hectares of land with a perimeter of 43km. The University is actively engaging the Federal Government to fence the campus particularly after the last unfortunate incident of the kidnapping of three female students of the university.

“The institution is putting in place several security measures to protect lives and properties.  The Security Department Building is on-going and will be completed in a few weeks from today and e-security is being deployed. A security audit will soon be undertaken before the resumption of academic actvities.”

He assured that “the University will continue to engage her host communities for a cordial relationship and peaceful coexistence. We look forward to settling the boundary issues with them soon. And the University will continue to work with the security agencies and the Benue State Government for peace on campus and collaboration on many endcavours; only then can the people of Benue State reap the fruits of scientific research offered by the University, Benue State remains the main entity of the University.”