The National Association of Nigerian Students has asked that similar actions be taken against home-based institutions offering unaccredited courses, in light of the Federal Ministry of Education’s announcement on Tuesday that it will no longer be evaluating or accrediting degree certificates from the Republic of Benin and Togo.
According to The PUNCH News, the ministry placed roughly eighteen of those educational establishments on a blacklist after a Nigerian newspaper’s undercover investigation revealed the operations of a degree mill in Cotonou, the capital of the Benin Republic.
The probe revealed that the disguised journalist completed the National Youth Service Corps program and graduated from a Cotonou institution in six weeks.
NANS praised the Federal Government for suspending the review and accreditation of degree credentials from Benin Republic and Togovian schools in a statement signed on Wednesday by its president, Elvis Ekundina, of the National Senate.
The government was urged to “extend its sanction to tertiary institutions operating in Nigeria who are offering courses without accreditation from relevant authorities,” according to the students’ association.
The use of dishonest means by certain Nigerians to obtain degrees from Benin Republic and Togo in order to obtain employment chances for which they are unqualified was denounced by NANS as outrageous.
The association charged the Federal Government “to commence investigation into the activities of the Federal Ministry of Education, National Universities Commission (NUC), National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) and other agencies fingered in the fraudulent activities of obtaining degree certificates from foreign universities.“
The statement read, “While we commend the Federal Government for its quick decision to suspend the accreditation of degree certificates obtained from institutions in Benin Republic and Togo, it is, however, important for the government to take further steps into investigating the activities of relevant agencies fingered in the fraudulent activities.
“This is the only way the Federal government can save its face and restore the battered image of the country.
“We also want to use this opportunity to call on the government to beam its searchlight into the activities of tertiary institutions, especially privately owned ones, that are running unaccredited courses.
“These institutions, in their fraudulent act, are destroying our education sector and swindling innocent young Nigerians of their money by offering them unaccredited courses.
“NANS describes these universities and polytechnics offering unaccredited courses as illegal institutions as we want the government to deal with them appropriately.”
In order to reposition the country’s education system, Ekundina called on the Federal Government to work with NANS and other student bodies to eradicate illicit postsecondary educational establishments.
