Out of the total 461 staff members of Ogbonnaya Onu Polytechnic (previously known as Abia State Polytechnic) in Aba, 340 who were laid off between 2018 and 2021 have received their payments from the Abia State government.
Advertisements
The state has also assured that the remaining employees will be compensated once their verification process is complete.
Governor Alex Otti shared this information while speaking to reporters at the Government House in Umuahia, stating that his administration intends to look into the reasons behind their dismissal to potentially reinstate those who were unjustly terminated.
He praised the polytechnic’s management for securing N2 billion in funding from the Tertiary Education Trust Fund, TETFund.
Regarding the $125 million loan from the Islamic Development Bank that was recently approved for Abia by President Bola Tinubu and the National Assembly, Otti downplayed concerns about significant risks tied to the loan, mentioning that the only potential issue could be foreign exchange fluctuations.
Otti also disclosed that his administration has invested approximately N14.43 billion in upgrading 61 public schools as of June 2025, countering claims from an APC group that it mismanaged N54 billion allocated for education in Abia.
Additionally, he instructed the Abia State Commissioner for Health, Professor Enoch Uche, to initiate the construction of an isolation and treatment facility at the Abia State Specialist Hospital in Amachara.