Dr Minkailu Bah
Minister of Education, Dr Minkailu Bah says that in three years the government will phase out the recently-introduced fees' subsidies for university students and introduce a student loan scheme. Speaking yesterday at a conference on how to fund the University of Sierra Leone he said his ministry was "contemplating recommending to the government of Sierra Leone, a line of funding for tertiary level institutions that will be based on annual ratings for performance such as student satisfaction, employment status of graduates, research and staffing" Dr Bah said the government spent more than Le 46 billion on fee subsidies in the University of Sierra Leone alone this year and hoped the conference would be backed by "other conferences in other areas that impact on funding like the branding of University products". He said the "University has vast resources that are under-utilised or unutilised" citing its manpower capability in the area of research, machinery and equipment, laboratory facilities and land. The minister said the university "must increasingly see itself as a business with goods to sell. Gone are the days when the name Fourah Bay College was enough. Consumers are being presented with an increasing assortment of attractive goods that are competitively priced". The Acting Vice Chancellor of the University said that following "substantial increment in personal emoluments, faculty and staff must now get value for money by the output of the constituent colleges" and challenged the Academic Staff Association to play an active part in resource mobilisation. Prof Ekundayo Thompson said that to mobilise resources "FBC's 479 acre land which lies idle must be put to work otherwise it becomes an attraction for land grabbers and the University must involve its alumni worldwide" in the funding effort. Earlier Finance Minister, Dr Karifala Marah told the conference that the University must "lead the process of linking human development to natural resources". He said the institution must undertake "commercially-driven research" and move out of its "comfort zones" as all institutions must now be "efficient". The conference ends today. (C) Politico 20/03/14
