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The immediate past Minister of Innovation, Science and Technology, Uche Nnaji, indeed forged his University of Nigeria Nsukka (UNN) degree certificate, an investigative panel set up by Nigeria’s Minister of Education, Tunji Alausa, has found.
The seven-member panel was constituted on 23 November 2025 in response to Mr Nnaji’s petition to the education minister following a painstaking two-year investigation published by PREMIUM TIMES in October last year, which revealed that the then-minister forged his degree and NYSC certificates.
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The panel submitted its detailed report to the education minister in December 2025.
Nnaji’s petition and constitution of the panel
In the petition dated 14 October 2025, Mr Nnaji alleged unethical disclosure, document tampering, and political manipulation of his academic records by senior officials of UNN.
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The former minister also accused the UNN Vice-Chancellor, Simon Ortuanya, and a former Acting Vice-Chancellor of the institution, Oguejiofor Ujam, of “issuing forged or unauthorised correspondence, improperly accessing his academic file, and facilitating media publications that misrepresented his academic history.”
The probe panel was led by the Director of the University Education Department in the ministry, Rakiya Gambo Ilyasu, while James Ocheido, the deputy director of the department, served as secretary.
Other members of the panel were: the Director of Polytechnics and Allied Institutions Department in the ministry, Ejeh. A. U; his counterpart in the ministry’s Colleges of Education Department, U. C. Uba; and a representative of the Executive Secretary of the National Universities Commission (NUC), Mohammed Ayuba.
The Director of Human Resources Unit of the education ministry, Yusuf Saeed, and his counterpart in the ministry’s Legal Services Unit, Foluso Akinlonu, were also members of the panel.
The panel said it adopted “documentary review, interviews, verification, and technical audit as its methodological approach” to the investigation.
It said during the investigation, members physically visited UNN, engaged with the institution’s officials—including its vice-chancellor and former acting vice-chancellor—and reviewed necessary documents and the university records.
The UNN officials interviewed during the investigation were the university’s Vice-Chancellor, Professor Ortuanya; a former Acting Vice-Chancellor, Professor Ujam; the Registrar, Celine Nnebedum; Records Unit officials; and other staff members involved in handling academic records.
The panel said that during the investigation, it also accessed and inspected Mr Nnaji’s academic files and internal correspondence – including the 2023 and 2025 letters issued by UNN.
It added that it examined UNN’s historic academic records, registry movement logs, Senate lists, convocation archives, electronic access logs, and other relevant documentation, including Mr Nnaji’s transcript request, as well as verification of the provenance and authenticity of letters issued to media organisations and government agencies by the university.
“The members of the panel arrived (UNN) in Nsukka on Sunday, 23rd November 2025. On Monday, 24th November, the panel paid a courtesy visit to the Vice Chancellor, Prof Simon Ortuanya and informed him of the purpose of the visit and proceeded to the venue the university provided for the panel to use,” the report stated.
‘Nnaji forged his UNN certificate’
A PREMIUM TIMES investigation had revealed that although Mr Nnaji was admitted to study biological sciences at UNN during the 1981/82 academic session, he did not graduate and was not issued a certificate after failing one of his courses —Virology (MCB 431AB).
In the federal government panel report, exclusively obtained by PREMIUM TIMES after months of searching for the document, investigators said they conducted “a thorough review of the Senate-approved graduation list of 1985 and the personal student file” of Mr Nnaji and found, among others, that his name was not in the graduation list in the 1985 set.
The panel said it obtained “several correspondences” dated from 8 November 1985 to 19 May 1986 between Mr Nnaji and the Registry Department of the university regarding his failed course MCB 431 – Virology, which were documented from pages 69 to 55 of the former minister’s academic file.
It added that Mr Nnaji, in his handwritten correspondence dated 19 May 1986 and titled “Application to take course, 431AB in September,” explained that he could not write the exam scheduled for 21 April 1986 due to ill health, and attached a supporting medical report.
“The panel was unable to find any record of him (Nnaji) having taken the failed course,” the report further read.
The panel then wondered how Mr Nnaji obtained the “purported certificate of graduation” dated July 1985, which he submitted to President Bola Tinubu for appointment and to the National Assembly for his ministerial confirmation.
The panel’s findings on Mr Nnaji align completely with this newspaper’s report, which exposed the then-minister’s criminal and unethical certificate forgery.
READ ALSO: Forgery: Lawyer blasts Nigerian govt for failing to prosecute ex-minister Uche Nnaji
Background
In October 2023, PREMIUM TIMES began investigating Mr Nnaji’s academic records.
The then-minister had submitted a degree and NYSC certificates to President Bola Tinubu and the Nigerian Senate during his ministerial confirmation in 2023.
He claimed he obtained a degree certificate from UNN, where he purportedly graduated in 1985.
Apparently disturbed that he was under scrutiny, Mr Nnaji filed a suit at the Federal High Court in Abuja to block both UNN and its vice-chancellor, Mr Ortuanya, a professor, from releasing his academic records.
Apart from the UNN and its vice-chancellor, the minister of education, the NUC, the university’s registrar, a former UNN Acting Vice-Chancellor, Mr Ujam, and the Senate of the university were listed as defendants in the suit.
But before the minister could obtain an injunction, Mr Ortuanya had responded to PREMIUM TIMES’ FOI letter, confirming that Mr Nnaji had forged his UNN degree certificate.
The UNN registrar would shortly thereafter corroborate Mr Ortuanya’s position, indicating that although Mr Nnaji was admitted to the university in 1981, he neither graduated nor was issued any certificate.
NYSC authorities, in response to a separate FOI letter from PREMIUM TIMES, had disowned the discharge certificate in possession of the then-minister.
Mr Nnaji resigned from his position as minister three days after this newspaper published the investigation exposing how he forged his degree and NYSC certificates.
Many Nigerians had called for Mr Nnaji’s prosecution, maintaining that his resignation was inadequate in light of his violations of various Nigerian laws, including the Criminal Code Act.
Last week, a legal practitioner, Liborous Oshoma, criticised the Nigerian government for failing to prosecute Mr Nnaji, over the certificate forgery scandal, maintaining that people like the former minister “should be prosecuted and banned from holding public office to serve as a deterrent to others.”
Meanwhile, PREMIUM TIMES exclusively reported in February that the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission began an investigation into Mr Nnaji’s forgery scandal.
Insiders had told this newspaper that the former minister could be prosecuted if the investigation shows that he truly forged his credentials.
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