The Minister of Education, Adamu Adamu, has revealed that he was one of the angriest journalists in Nigeria at the time President Muhammadu Buhari picked him as education minister.
He disclosed this at a valedictory ceremony organised by the ministry in his honour and that of the Minister of State for Education, Goodluck Opiah, in Abuja on Thursday.
The minister said due to his point of view, he thought he was not fit to be appointed minister by any president.
Mr Adamu said, “I was a poor journalist and one of the most angry journalists in the country at that time, so I didn’t fit in any power that will consider me to become a minister.
Also, some heads of parastatals in the ministry poured accolades on the minister for his giant strides in eight years.
The Executive Secretary of the Tertiary Education Trust Fund, Sonny Echono, said the minister is a leader, boss and mentor who was able to identify talents and nurture them for the growth of the sector.
Echono, who is also a former permanent secretary in the ministry, said under Adamu’s watch, the country now has a university of health sciences in each geopolitical zone.
According to him, through his ingenuity, loyalty and support for the president, the education sector had witnessed tremendous growth.
“In TETFund, we have seen a phenomenal growth in our revenue from two per cent to three per cent and that will ensure that a target of 500 million going to tertiary institutions each year will be realised in the near future.
“We also have seen the delivery of projects, presently we have 275 projects awaiting commissioning, completed in the last few months and many more will be completed in due course,” he said.
Also, the Director, Federal Scholarship Board, Hajia Asta Ndajiwo, praised the minister for bringing sanity into the federal scholarship programme through equal distribution of scholarship awards to the 36 states and FCT.
Ndajiwo also said that the minister was able to clear all scholarship debts inherited when he came into office in 2015.
Chief executives from TRCN, NECO, JAMB, WAEC and others graced the occasion.
Mr Adamu has been the longest-serving Minister of Education since Nigeria’s return to democratic rule in 1999.
He was appointed by the outgoing President Muhammadu Buhari in 2015 and served as Minister of Education for 8 years
Mr Buhari regime of whom Mr Adamu is a part is expected to handover to the incoming administration on May 29, 2023.
(NAN)
