Gabriella Ogbu<\/p>\n
The Committee of Vice Chancellors of Nigerian Universities (CVCNU) has called on the Federal Government to provide institutions with a discounted energy tariff rate. This plea is grounded in the urgent need to reduce the financial strain imposed by exorbitant electricity costs.<\/p>\n
Prof. Yakubu Ochefu, the secretary of the CVCNU, highlighted the issue in an interview with The PUNCH on Saturday. He pointed out that no university or other postsecondary institution can sustain the high electricity tariffs currently in place, referencing the University of Ilorin as a prime example. According to Prof. Wahab Egbewole, the vice-chancellor of the University of Ilorin, the university’s monthly power bill has skyrocketed from N70 million to N230 million, a situation he deems “unsustainable.”<\/p>\n
Despite efforts to adopt green energy solutions like solar power, the expansive campuses and significant expenses force universities to depend on the public electricity grid. Ochefu elaborated, \u201cFor the past ten years, universities have been trying to diversify energy consumption by promoting green energy solutions, such as solar, but the cost is significant. Consequently, we had to rely on the public power system, which has also become very expensive. The FG is not providing sufficient funds to support the public power bills.\u201d<\/p>\n
He emphasized the financial dilemma faced by the universities, stating, “The implication is that universities cannot cover these costs, and we can\u2019t pass them on to users. Universities do not have the resources to meet these bills. We have told the government that there must be a concessionary rate for tertiary institutions, especially in the education sector.\u201d<\/p>\n
Ochefu stressed that educational institutions should not be treated like commercial enterprises. He concluded, \u201cIf they can\u2019t give us a concessionary rate, they should increase funding so we can meet our needs.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Gabriella Ogbu The Committee of Vice Chancellors of Nigerian Universities (CVCNU) has called on the Federal Government to provide institutions with a discounted energy tariff rate. This plea is grounded in the urgent need to reduce the financial strain imposed by exorbitant electricity costs. Prof. Yakubu Ochefu, the secretary of the CVCNU, highlighted the issue […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":28509,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[172],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-35328","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"aioseo_notices":[],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35328","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35328"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35328\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":35329,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35328\/revisions\/35329"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/28509"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35328"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35328"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35328"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}