The federal government says there are no plans to sell or concession Federal Unity Colleges across the country.

Tunji Alausa, minister of education, spoke in Abuja on Wednesday while addressing journalists on the controversy surrounding the concession of the King’s College, Lagos to the King’s College Old Boys Association (KCOBA).

In recent weeks, parents and teachers of the college have staged protests against attempts by KCOBA to take over the school’s management in furtherance of the arrangement reached with the government.

The tension grew on Monday when schools officially resumed and members of the Association of Senior Civil Servants of Nigeria (ASCSN) declared an industrial action, disrupting resumption across unity colleges nationwide.

However, Alausa summoned an emergency meeting with the workers’ union, including the leadership of the Trade Union Congress (TUC).

Following the meeting, the TUC urged ASCSN to suspend the industrial action, while Alausa called on all staff and students of unity colleges to resume the following day.

King’s College staff and parents, however, blocked members of KCOBA from accessing the school for any activity.

The development degenerated into a fracas, prompting the intervention of men of the Lagos police command.

Speaking at the press briefing on Wednesday, Alausa said the government would not extend the concession arrangement to other unity schools.

“No. We’re not extending it. Government still has its responsibility,” the minister said.

“Federal government, through the federal ministry of education, does not have the intention to sell any Unity College, and we will not sell any Unity College.”

The minister said the government had invited the aggrieved unions for further discussions, subject to the condition that ministry workers return to their offices and the ministry gates were not blocked.

He said the conditions were necessary to ensure the safety of officials and maintain law and order, while condemning alleged harassment of staff, destruction of property and blocking of ministry gates.

“We will not tolerate that as a government. We’ve given them all the room and scope to do their protest within the ambit of the law,” Alausa said.

The minister said the proposed arrangement with KCOBA was intended to mobilise additional resources to rehabilitate and modernise King’s College while retaining government ownership of the institution.

According to him, the decision was driven by the extensive deterioration of infrastructure at the school and the need to restore its former standard.

Alausa said he had visited the school unannounced and observed poor conditions in some hostels, bathrooms, classrooms, laboratories and other facilities.

The minister said KCOBA had expressed willingness to invest substantially in the institution through a non-profit foundation and indicated that it would maintain merit-based admission while ensuring students from across the country continued to have access to the school.

He added that the association claimed to have invested more than N2 billion in supporting infrastructure at the college over the years.

The minister said the government faces a significant funding gap in rehabilitating the country’s 115 Federal Unity Colleges, noting that the accumulated infrastructure deficit could not be addressed immediately through government funding alone.

“President Bola Tinubu is investing in infrastructure, including the sub-sector, but there’s so much significant infrastructure gap that has happened for 40 years and we don’t have the funds,” he said.

He estimated that even N2 trillion would not be enough to address the infrastructure needs of all the Unity Colleges.

To complement government funding, Alausa said the federal government has secured approval to repurpose about $20 million from a World Bank-supported programme for the comprehensive rehabilitation of selected unity colleges.

He said about 20 schools had been selected for the intervention, although the funding would cover schools across the country.

The minister added that the estimated cost of rehabilitating Unity Colleges in the south-west alone was nearly N100 billion, making it necessary for the government to explore additional funding options without conceding the institutions.