EFCC Goes After VCs Who Take N5.7m Furniture Allowance

By John Andah

The Executive Secretary of the National Universities Commission (NUC), Prof. Abubakar Rasheed, says that Vice-Chancellors of some Federal universities collect over N480, 000 as furniture allowance monthly.

According to reports, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) is investigating the VCs over the allegation.

The NUC chief made known the financial irregularities at a workshop on economic recovery and growth for bursars of federal universities on Tuesday in Abuja.

According to him, many universities allow their VCs to collect about N480,000 furniture allowance and N90,000 Duty Tour Allowance when top civil servants in the Education ministry collect about N20,000 as Duty Tour Allowance.

Meanwhile, acting EFCC Chairman Ibrahim Magu has fixed a meeting with bursars and the VCs who are under the agency’s investigation for this week.

“There are many areas where you have to put your heads together. We have a lot of problems and you know them. If we may ask you as bursars in federal universities, what salaries do you pay your Vice-Chancellors? You will see that there may be as many salaries as there are many universities here. And this is one of the sources of crises,” Rasheed said.

”If all the 40 federal universities pay one single salary to all the VCs, that problem will have been resolved. This is why many of the university people are being taken to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission.

”The EFCC Chairman, Ibrahim Magu, is coming to my office this week to pay a courtesy visit. He wants me to even arrange a meeting with the VCs and bursars. The EFCC is investigating so many universities as you are aware. One of the areas being investigated by the EFCC is the Furniture Allowance.”