PTDF interviews 700 candidates for foreign scholarships

There are currently 700 candidates being interviewed for the Petroleum Technology Development Fund's (PTDF) foreign scholarship program across the nation's six geopolitical zones.

Sobomabo West, the OSS team head for the South-South geopolitical zone, said this yesterday while addressing reporters shortly after the candidate interviews at the University of Port Harcourt.

While around 500 applicants were being interviewed for the Master of Science (MSc) program, according to West, approximately 180 applicants were applying for the Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) program.

He said, “The organisers are the Petroleum Technology Development Fund but we use panellists from different universities in Nigeria. We are here to interview candidates for MSc scholarship and also for PhD scholarship.

“We started the programme yesterday and so far, for the MSc scholarship, we have been able to interview more than 100 candidates and for PhD, we have been able to interview more than 50 candidates.

“We hope to finish the process on Friday. I don’t have the number off-hand but for MSc, we are hoping to interview up to 500 and for PhD, we are looking at about 180 candidates.

“Most of the candidates must not come to the centre because some of them are in Abuja and Lagos. We have also said that wherever they are, they can attend their interviews. If a candidate that is slated for Port Harcourt is living in Abuja, he can go to the Abuja centre and be interviewed.

“We also have online interviews, but that have not started; That will be after we have finished the physical interviews.

“The scholarship is for disciplines in the oil and gas sector like engineering, geology, environmental science, mechanical engineering and all that.”

In a separate interview with journalists, Dr. Joseph Abiebibama, coordinator of postgraduate programs at the Institute of Petroleum Studies (IPS), University of Port Harcourt, praised PTDF for picking the institution to serve as the hub for the scholarship program in the South-South region of the nation.

Abiebibama said, “I think it is a laudable development for PTDF to choose the University of Port Harcourt as the centre for the overseas scholarship scheme for the South-South zone.”

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