Only few universities can compete with Kadpoly –Rector

For the past three months the Academic Staff Union of Polytechnics (ASUP) has been on an indefinite strike, how is this industrial action affecting your institution?It’s a nationwide strike directed by the national body of ASUP and our branch here joined. The union has its grievances with respect to certain issues. Certainly it has affected […]

For the past three months the Academic Staff Union of Polytechnics (ASUP) has been on an indefinite strike, how is this industrial action affecting your institution?
It’s a nationwide strike directed by the national body of ASUP and our branch here joined. The union has its grievances with respect to certain issues. Certainly it has affected us because any time the academic staff embarked on strike, the school will shut down because the academic activities will automatically come to a halt. Not only that, the academic staff are on strike, the senior non-academic staff have been on strike as well. We are hoping that there will be an amicable agreement between the union and the government so that the strike can be called off; so that the sector can bounce back. No strike is positive. Certainly the strike is negatively affecting academic pursuit of our teeming students. We are praying for God’s intervention.
Your predecessors had serious battles with unions which brought the school to a standstill on many occasions. How is your relationship cordial with the unions?
It’s all about constructive engagement. I met some fundamental issues on ground that bordered on allowances. When we came in we engaged them and we let them know that we are willing to solve their problems within the limits of our financial and available resources. They understand this and we have not disappointed them.  It’s quite difficult and challenging for a large institution with so many problems to be using Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) to pay allowances.  So it is by direct interaction, dialogue and continuous discussion with them that actually has resulted in this understanding. If I must be frank, it is not easy; psychologically it is quite tormenting but then I thank God for the understanding we are enjoying. We have started seeing to the allowances and as you can see the tension is low in the institution.
We have a strategic plan of solving the issue and we are implementing it point by point and step by step.
There was a report that you inherited over a billion naira debt, what is the debt profile of Kaduna Polytechnic now?
I met liabilities of over a billion naira but right now we have reduced it to about N700 million. The debt has to do with allowances. In the hand over note, we saw the profile of excess workload, hazard allowances and over deduction of contributory pensions and all these were verified by various visitation panels and auditors. There is also debt owed to contractors by previous administration. We have been offsetting these liabilities with the little resources we are getting.
What are your plans for the institution?
Making the institution to maintain its number one position in the comity of polytechnics in the country with respect to delivering of quality education is my number one plan. As a technical institution we are supposed to produce people that will employ others on graduation and not those who will be looking for job.  We are also looking at our role in the society as a tertiary institution with bias on technical education; our target is to help address youth unemployment by training the youth.  Right now the Kaduna Refining and Petrochemical Company (KRPC) is partnering with us to train youth in contagious communities.  We are also going to train about 1,000 youth for the state government.  We are trying to establish a centre to be dedicated to youth training as part of efforts to contribute in addressing youth restiveness in the North.
The National Board for Technical Education (NBTE) has introduced the National Vocational Qualification Framework (NVQF) we want to key into that and see how we can render training and certification. If you want to be a plumber, be a well trained and certified one.
Your institution and Yaba College of Technology were selected for conversion to universities many years ago, what is delaying it?
The conversion issue is purely a governmental policy and countries world over change their policy on education on the basis of the needs of the society. I was not on ground when the idea started but I was told that at one stage it got to the Federal Executive Council and a decision was taken on it. Governmental policies are never static. Along the line a policy came up that it could be the same awarding of degrees but in different modes. Whichever way it is, the bottom line is that these institutions are ripe for award of degrees. Certainly, I prefer the conversion of the institution to university but as I said earlier, it is purely a governmental decision. The government knows the best and they will do it for the enhancement of the country’s education sector.
The non-conversion is making our well-trained staff to be leaving the system and this is not good. We trained people up to PhD level and after serving their bonds they ran to the universities; this is not good for the system. Ordinarily, nobody will like to be running about; moving from one job to another; ideally you want to settle down and contribute your quota to the development of the country. So we believe the government is looking into that because certainly it will be good for the system.
Critics say that your institution lacks the capacity to run degrees, how will you react to this?
I totally disagree with this; we have everything that is needed for the award of degrees. Every year we always pass the accreditation of the NBTE; all our programmes are accredited. We have what it takes to award degrees; one, in terms of equipment in the workshops and laboratories. Two, in terms of manpower, we have a great number of PhD holders; we have over 300 of them and another 300 are currently on training both within and abroad.
Are you saying you have over 600 PhD holders?
Well, we have many of them on ground. In fact very few universities can compete with us in terms of the number of PhD holders and what have you. Most of them are young men, energetic with a lot of brain energy to contribute in the sector. You know, Kadpoly is only second to Ahmadu Bello University in terms of size and population. The human capacity is there and we have the equipment that we acquired over the years.
We have everything it takes to be converted to a university. I don’t want to start making comparisons but we are better than many universities. We have a department that has more than 10 laboratories and I can’t see any university that can boost of this. In terms of equipment and manpower we have more than what is required to be converted to a university.
Federal Government recently ordered polytechnics to stop running Post Graduate Diploma and your institution is still doing it, why?
The post graduate programme we are running is in affiliation with Federal University of Technology, Minna and I don’t see anything bad with that. May be they are talking about polytechnics that are mounting it on their own. I feel it is time enough to appreciate the fact that the polytechnics do contribute significantly to the economic growth of the country and any attempt to strangulate them will not augur well for the country. What is required is to create a level playing ground for all sectors to compete favourably and contribute to the development of the country.