The Nigerian government said it has released N50 billion out of the N200 billion promised Needs Assessment Fund as part of the recent agreement reached with the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU).
Speaking during an interview on Arise Television on Sunday, the Minister of Education, Tunji Alausa, said another N50 billion will soon be released, bringing the total to N100 billion.
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Mr Alausa said the education ministry would meet the heads of universities, polytechnics and colleges of education to decide how the Needs Assessment Fund will be spent.
The Needs Assessment Fund is a component of the contentious 2009 agreement between ASUU and the federal government.
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The 2009 agreement, whose renegotiation was due in 2013, stalled for over a decade until it was completed on 23 December 2025 and unveiled on 14 January.
The education minister said implementation of the 2025 renegotiated agreement began immediately after it was signed.
“This is not about choreography or grandstanding. The circular for implementation was issued before the end of December,” he said.
Mr Alausa said the agreement has helped stabilise Nigeria’s university system, noting that there has been no strike in federal universities in the last two academic sessions.
He added that the ministry has created a Labour and Union Activities Unit to ensure full implementation of agreements with workers’ unions under the ministry’s purview.
Unpaid strike arrears
Regarding the unresolved issue of unpaid salaries from the 2022 ASUU strike, the minister said President Bola Tinubu had only committed to paying half of the eight-month arrears and had fulfilled that promise.
“The agreement was 50 per cent, and the president paid five months within his first six months in office. There was never a promise to pay eight months,” he said.
He acknowledged that the agreement was not properly documented at the time, describing it as a lapse in institutional record-keeping.
IPPIS and university autonomy
Mr Alausa said universities, polytechnics and colleges of education had been removed from the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS) since January 2025.
“They are not being paid on IPPIS again. You can go and fact check me,” he stated.
He added that institutions had also been allowed to move their research and endowment funds from the Treasury Single Account to commercial banks to improve access.
Polytechnics, TVET and degree reforms
Beyond universities, the minister said the government was reforming technical and vocational education and training (TVET), including plans to allow polytechnics to award degrees.
Mr Alausa said the government had reduced vocational trades from 98 to 25 based on labour-market needs and introduced stipends for trainees, adding that over 1.3 million Nigerians applied when the TVET portal was opened.
He also said technical education is now free at all 36 federal technical colleges, with 70 per cent of training practical and a final-year industrial attachment modelled on Germany’s dual system.
Under the TVET initiative, students receive monthly stipends of about N25,000, while the government funds training centres.
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