As the educational needs continues to grow across Nigeria, more stakeholders are joining calls for the establishment of additional universities.
The surge in demand is driving key stakeholders, including the National Universities Commission (NUC), to advocate for the expansion of the university network to better accommodate the country’s evolving educational landscape.
Currently, Nigeria boasts of 274 Universities as at today, comprising 62 Federal, 63 States and 149 Private universities.
However, according to data obtained from NUC, Nigeria’s educational system witnessed an annual enrolment of over 2 million prospective individuals seeking university admission with the existing institutions only able to accommodate between 500,000 and 700,000 candidates.
This stark discrepancy underscores the urgent need for more universities to bridge the gap and meet the growing demand for higher education, according to the experts.
Speaking on the subject when a
delegation from the International Institute of On-line Education (IIOE), China, an affiliate Institute linked with the United Nations Education, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO), led by Professor Jiansheng Liang paid him a courtesy visit, the Acting Executive Secretary, NUC, Mr. Chris J. Maiyaki
stressed the need to address the access gap.
According to him, Nigeria currently faced significant problem of access as universities available could hardly cater for the demand for university education.
The NUC scribe also lamented that the system witnessed an annual enrolment of over 2 million prospective individuals seeking university admission with the existing institutions only able to accommodate between 500,000 and 700,000 candidates.
He reiterated that the NUC remained unwavering in its commitment towards facilitating the establishment of additional universities across Nigeria.
This strategic initiative, he said, was aimed at bolstering accessibility and meeting the escalating demands for tertiary education and drew attention of his visitors to the fact that despite the presence of 149 Private universities, they could only cater for approximately 10 percent of the Nigerian university population.
Maiyaki added that the developmental trajectory of these private institutions also required granting them time to mature and expand their capacity in order to effectively contribute to the educational landscape.
Giving insight on the emergence of NUC, he recounted that the Commission was established in 1962 as an administrative unit in the Cabinet Office and eventually became a statutory agency in 1974.
Chronicling the history of university education in Nigeria, he explained that this dated back to 1948 with the establishment of University College, Ibadan, followed by the founding of the first indigenous university, the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, in 1960; and subsequently the Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria; University of Lagos, Lagos as well as Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, in 1962 and University of Benin in 1970, which marked the culmination of the first-generation universities.
He said the Mid-70’s was the period that the government responded massively to the demand for tertiary education, which saw the emergence of second-generation universities and later supplemented by the establishment of private Universities in 1999.
Speaking recently on the topic while presenting provisional licences to two new private universities in Abuja, the Minister of Education, Professor Tahir Mammam said there was a compelling need to establish more universities in Nigeria.
Mamman said although Nigeria already has over 265 universities, “the need to establish more universities has never been more compelling.”
He said the government will continue to welcome proposals for the establishment of private universities by credible groups and organisations “as long as the gap of access to university education continues to widen and the enrolment of students in excess of the standard carrying capacity of the Nigeria University System persists.”
However, he noted that the approvals for establishing new private universities will be subjected to the prescribed criteria by the National Universities Commission (NUC).
“When compared with countries with similarly large and growing populations such as Indonesia, which has a population of 274 million and 3,162 universities (122 public, 3,040 private); South Korea with a population of 51 million, has 203 universities 20 public, 183 private); Vietnam with a population of about 97 million people has 185 universities (120 public, 65 private); Turkey with a population of about 84 million has 207 universities (128 public, 79 private); and Pakistan, with a population of 220 million has about 217 universities (148 public, 69 private), we still have a lot of ground to cover,” he said.
