Educational Funding Intervention Management and Manpower Development in Tertiary Institutions: Exploring the University of Nigeria

Abstract Tertiary education in Nigeria has witnessed a sharp decline in funding following the proliferation of public and private universities in the 1970s and 1980s. The establishment of Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFund) in 2011 and its objectives of ameliorating the challenges of funding and enhancing key areas of infrastructure and research development have become a major font of debate among scholars. This study interrogates the disconnect between funding intervention and manpower development, using the University of Nigeria, Nsukka campus as a study area, and adopting a multi-layered qualitative approach that combined the essential features of key informant interview (KII), focused group discussions, field observations reports and documentary evidence. Embracing the basic assumptions of Institutional Corruption Theory, the study found that TETFund intervention disbursement in the University of Nigeria, Nsukka campus, lacks transparency, and therefore recommends a more transparent-meritorious means of fund intervention disbursement and prioritizing staff development programmes.