The federal government on Tuesday, reversed the 18-year admission benchmark in tertiary institutions, saying the policy is no longer in the nation’s education policy.
However, the government said there will be no reversal on its decision voiding over 22,700 degree certificates obtained by Nigerians in some “fake” universities in neighbouring Togo and Benin Republic.
The new Minister of Education, Dr. Tunji Alausa, declared these during an interactive session he held with newsmen, shortly after assuming office alongside the new Minister of State for Education, Dr. Suwaiba Ahmad.
Dr. Alausa hinted that his administration would carry out review of the nation’s education policy at the basic education level to inculcate civic education among others.
Responding to question on whether the federal government will continue with the 18-year benchmark for admission into the nation’s universities, given the controversies trailing it, the minister said:”We will not be going forward with the 18 years. We will go back to what we had before-16 years. We will work with JAMB, our universities to ensure that people that are matriculating into our universities will be allowed at 16 years. There will be exceptions for gifted children. But the 18 years for going into the university is not part of our education policy again”.
He said despite the 16-year new policy, special needs students would be exempted.
“Special needs are highly talented and gifted students. We need to create opportunity for them. We have to let them excel. These are geniuses in our society. They are the innovators of what we need. They are genetically endowed to move our general society forward, ” he said.
The minister said government’s decision not to honour degrees acquired from some universities in Togo and Benin Republic stands, insisting that there would be no reversal.
“Let me just be clear with you, there will be no reversal of that policy. The former Minister of Education worked through the ministry of education’s process. He did a diligent work in verification and there was a lot of forensic evidence. They went to some of these universities and identified the ones that are not up to standard.
We can’t create a situation where people will cut corners. Cutting corners is cheating the people that have gone the right way to do the right thing. So, there will not be any reversal, the ministry of education has done its diligent work.
This came to the Federal Executive Council and I was part of FEC at that time, led by our chairman, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu. The Minister of Education did full briefing on this and we have FEC’s approval, so there will be no any reversal on this decision that has been taken, “he said.
Speaking on recent controversies in Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka and the Federal University of Health Sciences, Otokpo, Benue State, following appointments of vice chancellors and Registrars, the minister warned tertiary institutions’ governing councils against violating laid down rules.
He said any decisions found to have been taken by the councils outside the law would be reversed.
“We want freedom in our universities and polytechnics. They are centers of knowledge and freedom. We are a democratic government, and this president is very democratic. Our university councils are created to follow rules. Nobody will be allowed to make his or her own rules. No council is bigger than every one of us.
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“What is happening in Nnamdi Azikiwe University will be reversed based on our law. No council’s chairman is above the law. And we will not allow that to happen. Universities are centres where we expect freedom, university councils are meant to work closely with the senate of the university and the National Universities Commission. No chairman of any council will make his rule. Any abnormally that is observed will be reversed, the rule of the country is bigger than anybody, “he insisted.
Continuing, the minister said, “We will use existing government apparatus that
has been created by the law, that is the National Universities Commission, National Board for Technical Education, to ensure everyone follows the rule of law. There is governance now and the Minister of Education will play his oversight rule in a more vigorous manner. ”
While promising adequate funding of the universities, polytechnics and colleges of education, he reminded them that “where much is given, much is also expected. ”
He spoke on what his administration in the Federal Ministry of Education will work to achieve: “Let me first of all profusely thank the president, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, for the huge honour and privilege that he has given me to come with the Minister of State to superintend the ministry of education.
“You all know that President Bola Ahmed Tinubu campaigned all across the country and told Nigerians ‘I would be honest with you when I become president, I would take some difficult decisions.’ Now, 16 months after President Bola Ahmed Tinubu is the president of the country, he is meeting a lot of his campaign promises, most importantly, the promise that the president gave to Nigerians that ‘I would be honest with you, I would take difficult decisions so that we can put our country on the path of sustainability. ‘
“Decades from now, our younger generation will look back and say a big thank you to us. This is what the president is doing. We have to be ready, and we should as Nigerians take short term pain from the long term good. This is what the president is doing now.
“President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has taken difficult decisions that other leaders that came before him shied away from and that is why when we came in as a government, we had a lot of issues that we inherited.
“President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has also mandated us ministers that whatever decisions we make in terms of policies, execution and implementation, it has to be sustainable. He does not want palliative policies and implementation.
” I know Nigerians, that things are hard but please, bear with this president. We are beginning to see the fruits of these difficult decisions that our president has taken. Our microeconomic indicators are better, we are more respected internationally as the president is refocusing our country into the future where we will have the biggest economy in Africa and one of the biggest economies in the world. And in so doing, that is why the president decided to send me and the Minister of State, to the ministry of education, to push forward the Renewed Hope transformative agenda in the education system, in our education sector. We will work collaboratively with all of you, with every Nigerian to move our education system forward.
“To develop our education system, we need to realign our education system to te needs of Nigerians, the needs of the 24th century. We are churning out a lot of unemployable graduates in our country.
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“We will now focus on STEM, we have to be aggressively focussed on STEM-Science, Technology, Engineering, Maths and the second ‘M’ to that STEM is Medical Sciences.
“Today, we are bedeviled with lack of manpower to serve in our hospitals, to provide care for our people. We will focus and redirect our efforts on STEM. We will work with our universities; we will work with our polytechnics to do that. I will be meeting with our vice chancellor and all that.
“We have a unique population, young Nigerians that are ready to go to school, very uniquely intelligent young men and women, we need to provide the opportunity for them.
“The second thing that we are going to be doing to realign our education is that we will focus on technical and vocational education and training. We will use our federal technical colleges, national entrepreneur institutions to develop, create opportunities for our young citizens and our young men and women, give them lifelong skills to be useful to themselves, useful to their communities and useful to our nation.
“Henceforth, we will be focused on practical training, 80 percent of our education will be on practical training and 20 percent will ton classroom basis. We will engage private sector, artisans where we will incentivize them to take these arts students and train them more competently in these vocational trainings so that they can begin to use their abilities to develop our country.
“As we move into the future, all our universities of agriculture would be mandated to have their own mechanize farming, to train their students. We will provide resources, fund them and help them work with sub-national government to get arable land that they can start planting cash crops, so that we can begin to use our education system to supplement our agricultural and food security.
“All universities that have department of agriculture would also be mandated to have their own farming so that they can begin to train people on practical skills. We don’t want people to be given HND and B.SC in Agriculture without practical training. “