By Matthew Denis
The Minister of Education, Mallam Adamu Adamu has appealed to striking lecturers in higher institutions across the country to exercise patience as their demands will be resolved soon.
He made the disclosure at the 10th convocation ceremony of The Federal Polytechnic, Offa last Thursday.
The Minister who was represented by the Director of Tertiary Education, Mr. Joel Ojo, said, “Let me use this opportunity to appeal to various staff unions in all higher institutions across the country to be patient with us as efforts are ongoing to address their demands.
“Progress and development are usually scarce where there is no peace. Peaceful coexistence is very important in our education environment. I must commend the management, staff and students of the polytechnic for sustaining a peaceful academic environment.
“I want to also congratulate the leadership of the polytechnic on the recent pilot ranking and assessment of 112 polytechnics in Nigeria by the National Board for Technical Education (NBTE) in which the school emerged 8th position.”
He noted that the convocation ceremony is not only an occasion for appraisal in respect of achievements and challenges but an opportunity to reflect on the ideals, goals and objectives upon which the institution is established.
“It is therefore worthy to mention that the institution patented a research output titled ‘production of Hydrogen Storage Tank with Palladium Additive ‘ which can be used to power cars and aircraft which has been adopted and a certificate of Registration of patent awarded.
Earlier, the Rector of the polytechnic, Dr. Lateef Ademola Olatunji stated that a total of 4,915 students graduated in the 2017/2018 academic session.
He however urged the graduands to put into constructive use the qualitative educational instructions and skills they acquired from the polytechnic for the development and economic stability of the country.
The Rector mentioned some of the achievements of the institution such as accreditation of courses offered in the polytechnic by NBTE and commencement of Bachelor of Technology (B. Tech) programmes in affiliation with Federal University of Technology, Minna.
Others are ICAN accreditation of Accounting programmes, commencement of Computer Based Test for entrepreneurship examination, formation of interactive collaboration with the Nigeria communication satellite on efficient service delivery among others.
