The Federal Government of Nigeria has announced that only eight universities in Togo and Benin Republic are accredited to award degrees to Nigerians.
Minister of Education, Tahir Mamman, revealed during a television interview that over 22,500 Nigerians have acquired fraudulent degrees from unrecognized institutions in these countries.
The government plans to cancel these fake degrees to protect the integrity of Nigerian qualifications, following an investigation triggered by a journalist’s undercover report. This report exposed how easily degrees could be obtained from certain universities in Benin Republic and used for National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) deployment.
The government has identified three recognized universities in Togo—Universite De Lome, Universite De Kara, and Catholic University of West Africa—and five in Benin Republic which are Universite D’Abomey-Calavi, Universite De Parakou, Universite Nationale Des Sciences, Technologis Ingenierie Et Mathematiques, Universite Nationale D’Agriculture, and Universite Africaine De Development Cooperatif.
Degrees from any other institutions in these countries are considered illegal.
The government is also taking steps to identify and remove employees with fraudulent degrees and is urging the private sector to do the same.
This move aims to preserve the credibility of Nigerian educational qualifications and restore the nation’s reputation.
