By Rumbidzayi Zinyuke
Government is seeking investors to fund the building of state-of-the-art infrastructure at Manicaland State University of Applied Sciences, an official has said. Speaking during a tour of the university recently, Minister of Higher and Tertiary Education, Science and Technology Development Professor Amon Murwira said Government wanted to promote the flow of investment in the knowledge-based industry.
“Our grand plan is to make a university city,” he said. “We have an infrastructural development programme in place. In this programme, we are aiming to attract Foreign Direct Investment into our universities.”
Prof Murwira said the model involved the building of state-of-the-art hostels for students, office blocks and shopping malls at universities on Public Private Partnerships or Build Operate and Transfer models.
“For hostels, the model we want to use is that we will engage an investor, either foreign or local, to build it in about six months and we give them time to recover their money plus profit through student accommodation fees for the next 15 to 20 years, then they leave us with that infrastructure,” he said.
“We want to invest in office blocks and shopping malls at universities, which are the service centres for our students. So, while we don’t burden the fiscus, the student fees can be paying off the loans for the infrastructure.”
“Government cannot do it alone; we need our partners on this journey,” he said. “We have to understand what we really want to do as a country. Our objective for Manicaland State University is to be inspirational and we must work towards it.
“Our architecture must be inspirational. Our labs must be inspirational. Our lecturers must be very ambitious and inspirational.”
Government has also said it has engaged banks to ensure that students can access loans to pay their fees and decrease default rates.
This, Prof Murwira said, will ensure that universities use the funds to build and improve infrastructure, while ensuring that students get the best education.
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