Daily Independent Online.

* Tuesday, December 23, 2003.

NGO to build hostels at FUTO

By Ben Duru

Special Correspondent, Owerri

Scarce hostel accommodation, which has become acute at the Federal University of Technology (FUTO), Owerri, would soon be in abundant supply as a United States-based non-governmental organisation (NGO), the Owerri Peoples Congress in Houston, Texas, has promised to erect blocks of hostels for the students.

 This was made known by the Vice-Chancellor of the university, Professor Jude Njoku, who described the problems facing Nigerian universities as enormous and can be resolved only through the intervention of public-spirited individuals.

 He said it would be very difficult to find a university in Nigeria where daily problems do not weigh down on both academic and student life, and that the future of growth and progress lies in the hands of public spirited individuals.

 The vice-chancellor, who said this while receiving an award for excellence from the U.S.-based NGO, maintained that it now behoves on Nigerians living in the developed countries to come to the aid of the universities.

 He recalled that he travelled to the World Igbo Congress in August as well as the tour of major universities in the United States organised by the National University Commission (NUC), and that he used the opportunity to exchange views with many Nigerians from Imo State on how FUTO could be turned into a citadel of excellence. According to him, his trip “was very fruitful and rewarding. 

“I entered into agreement with some universities like the Tennessee State University as well as Prairie View A&M University in Texas, especially in the area of electrical/electronics and other fields that would lead to technological breakthroughs for Nigeria."

 To Njoku, it is unthinkable to have a university of technology or any university for that matter, which cannot boast of a single breakthrough in a chosen field, and that it was this worry that compelled him into looking for ways and means of changing that situation at FUTO.

 He explained that his linkages with Nigerians and Imo citizens in the U.S. brought him in contact with the Owerri Peoples Congress, which has promised not only to erect hostel blocks, but to award scholarships to deserving students and lecturers.

 Njoku said it was this kind of goodwill that Nigerian universities require in order to inject the much-needed life into the university system and give the students the best to prepare them for the task of building a better society.

President of the NGO, Dr. Cajetan Akujuobi, who is a lecturer at the Prairie View A&M University, said the award of excellence conferred on the vice-chancellor was in recognition of his untiring fight to ensure that FUTO is elevated. He said the body took the decision having noted Njoku’s demands and desires expressed during his trip to the U.S., saying, "we considered that here was a vice-chancellor who could have stayed in his hotel room and enjoyed himself, but he chose to attend every meeting and discussion all in the interest of FUTO."