Hon. Abubakar Kabir Bichi, member of the House of Representatives representing Bichi Federal Constituency of Kano State and chairman of the House Committee on Appropriation, has offered scholarships to 21 constituents to study in Malaysia.
The beneficiaries would be pursuing an 18-month programme in Engineering, Computing Science, Technology, among other courses at Universiti Technologi Malaysia (UTM), one of the highest ranking universities in Malaysia.
All the beneficiaries were presented with their admission letters and other enabling accessories in Bichi, Kano State, on Wednesday.
The lawmaker also sponsored 59 science and technical students from SS1 and SSS 3 and provided them with educational kits.
He further recruited 150 temporary classroom teachers as well as 50 Islamiyya teachers to teach at various schools across the Bichi local government area, as well as approving salary increment for the first batch of 106 teachers.
Speaking at the event, Hon. Abubakar Kabir Bichi said: “Two years back, we made this promise of sponsoring indigenes of Bichi Local Government. We have kept to our promise.
“All the candidates were selected based on merit and none of them is my relative. They all underwent thorough screening. I have never seen them before.
“We have been offering 100% scholarships to indigenes of Bichi to study at various Nigerian universities, including BUK, ABU, ABTU, among other universities.
“This is what leaders should do. People should be empowered based on their abilities. We don’t want to politicise education. We always require fair play. We want these youth in the future to lead this state.
“I always say that the southern part of the country is ahead of us educationally. However, crime has significantly reduced in Bichi Local Government because our people go to school and we will continue to sponsor them up to the university. We paid the school fees of hundreds of students at various educational levels.
“We built over 500 classrooms across Bichi Local Government. But this is not enough. That is why we employed temporary teachers to teach at various schools in the local government.”
