The inability of Caribbean governments to keep its commitment for the first time to help fund the The University of the West Indies can lead to peril for the regional tertiary education body.
This from Vice Chancellor Sir Hilary Beckles yesterday as he presented his report to he University Council, at Cave Hill, Barbados. The meeting was streamed live on the internet.
Sir Hilary said the university was “very concerned” about the situation and was moving to find alternative measures to raise the required capital.
“That is a damaging situation because without a budget there is no campus,” he said.
He said last year a company was contracted to look at the financial strength of the university.
The company reported that the university was facing financial challenges and there must be restructuring its internal operations and generate more revenue.
“They are saying that we are going to be in significant financial difficulty unless we are able to get an annual injection of US$75 million (TT$502m),” he said.
“That is where the rubber hits the road because at the moment the debt owing to this university by the Governments of the Caribbean is US$105 million (TT$703m).”
Sir Hilary said: “They are saying to us if we don’t collect these receivables, we are going to be in trouble as a university.”
He said during a recent meeting of the University Grants Committee with Caribbean Governments “and unfortunately all of our budgets were not discussed because not all Government were able to make commitments—an unfortunate development, that has never happened before.”
He said the university will have to engage new instruments to raise the required capital for the next five-year developmental plan. He said Caribbean Government’s were contributing less that 50 per cent to the overall operations of the University of the West Indies which operates campuses in Mona, Jamaica, Cave Hill, Barbados and St Augustine, Trinidad.
