A University of Oxford college is set to rename itself after the richest woman in Vietnam because of her donation to the college of £155 million.

Linacre College will ask the privy council to rename itself it to Thao College after airline tycoon, Nguyen Thi Phuong Thao, donated money to the college. The money will be used to help pay for a new graduate centre and graduate access scholarships.

Linacre College was founded in 1962 and was originally named after the Renaissance humanist, medical scientist and classist Thomas Linacre.

A statement made by Linacre College said: "We have long been one of the least well-endowed colleges at the university, so we are delighted that a significant part of the donation will be for our general endowment fund, to help support the daily running of college."

The move has been criticised by the Oxford University Climate Justice Campaign. Thao made her fortune from budget airline, VietJet Air, which is managed by Servico. It is the largest shareholder in HDBank which is the main financier of state-owned Vietnam National Petroleum Group.

The campaign previously called for the names of fossil fuel companies to be taken off of university buildings and institutes. In a statement they said: "We are disappointed to hear that Linacre College has accepted donations from Sovico group, a company whose fossil fuel extraction threatens our planet's survival,"the spokesperson said. "Linacre's own failure to date to become carbon-neutral shows that actions speak far louder than words. We are sad to hear what Linacre's actions have told us: that Linacre values money more than people and the planet."