Abia State Polytechnic, Aba, has lost its accreditation over non-payment of salaries and allowances of staff for 30 months.
The National Board for Technical Education made the announcement on Tuesday July 19, in a statement released by the Head of Media Department, Fatima Abubakar.
The accreditation was withdrawn after several warnings which management of the school including Governor of the state, Okezie Ikpeazu, did not heed to.
The NBTE further disclosed that they had to withdraw the accreditation status of the polytechnic just to safeguard the quality assurance mechanism of the Board as well as to ensure that students were not left at the mercy of demoralised staff that might resort to ‘under the table’ practices to survive.
The statement read;
“Regular payment of salary is one of the key components of the Board’s normative instruments for quality assurance in the polytechnics, and Technical & Vocational Education and Training institutions under her purview.
“The Board had drawn the attention of the polytechnic to the dangers of non-payment of salaries, including the suspension of quality assurance visits.
“The Governing Council and management of the polytechnic made several failed promises to settle the backlog of salary arrears and ensure regular payment of staff salaries.
“The Board went the extra mile of writing His Excellency, the Executive Governor of Abia State, Okezie Ikpeazu, informing him of the dire situation of the polytechnic but all to no avail.”
The board also told the National Youth Service Corps that “no product of the Abia State Polytechnic should be mobilised for national service until the management of the polytechnic resolves the issue of nonpayment of salary to its staffers, while the Board promised to notify the NYSC once the accreditation status of the polytechnic is restored.”
NBTE also said notice of the withdrawal of the accreditation of the polytechnic had been sent to the Tertiary Education Trust Fund and Industrial Training Fund in order to stop any official transaction with the polytechnic by those organisations.
The statement added;
“Polytechnic proprietors across the country are advised to take regular payment of salaries of staff seriously as failure could lead to loss of accreditation.”
This is also coming months after Abia state university teaching hospital also lost its accreditation over non-payment of salaries among other issues.