A Nigerian federal university, the Abubakar Tafawa Balewa University (ATBU), Bauchi State, is about to issue certificates for a postgraduate programme that the country’s education regulator did not approve before it was conducted by the Federal College of Animal Health and Production Technology (FCAHPT), Vom, Plateau State.
In 2020, the FCAHPT admitted more than 80 students for the Postgraduate Diploma (PGD) programme in Animal Production and Health, falsely advertising that it was running the programme in affiliation with ATBU. However, four years after the programme’s conclusion, the college could not issue the students their statement of results and certificates.
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“At first, they said some of our colleagues have not completed their projects. Later, they said our results are being delayed by ATBU,” one student told PREMIUM TIMES in May.
However, PREMIUM TIMES found that the programme was never approved by the National Universities Commission (NUC), which regulates all degree-awarding programmes in Nigeria. In fact, the NUC does not grant approval for colleges or polytechnics to run postgraduate programmes, whether independently or in affiliation with universities.
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Illegal certificates almost ready
PREMIUM TIMES can now report that the college is colluding with ATBU to certify the illegal PGD programme.
The results have now been approved by ATBU’s Department of Animal Production, Faculty of Agriculture and Agricultural Technology, and the Senate.
.In December, the university constituted a committee on the illegal academic programme and began final clearance for the students.
One university staffer described the process as a clear case of certificate racketeering.
However, the university spokesperson, Zailani Bappa, maintained that the university has no intention of issuing any illegal certificates.
“The university has no intention whatsoever to award any illegal certificate outside the normal process and approved by senate of the university. Anything other than that, the university has no intention to do that,” he said in a telephone interview.
How affiliate programmes work
In Nigeria, tertiary education is divided into three strata, with each category of institutions granting different levels of certification.
The colleges of education award the National Certificate of Education (NCE), polytechnics and colleges of health and technology award National Diploma (ND) and Higher National Diplomas (HND), while universities award bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral degrees. Universities also offer postgraduate diplomas (PGD), a non-degree certification for holders who graduated with a third class and holders of HND who wish to enrol for a masters’ degree.
The high demand for university education and limited space have birthed affiliate programmes, which currently run in more than 120 tertiary institutions in affiliation with 27 Nigerian universities, according to the NUC.
With such partnerships, students study at the affiliated institutions with the same curriculum as the parent university. The university oversees the programme and issues certificates and transcripts.
Process of establishing affiliations
Establishing affiliation programmes starts with an application to the university vice-chancellor, after which the university conducts an inspection.
If the university senate approves an application, both institutions sign a memorandum of understanding (MoU) and submit it to the NUC for verification and approval.
The NUC’s approval is mandatory before the programme takes off.
NUC refuses application for PGD
PREMIUM TIMES gathered that the college applied to ATBU to host affiliate academic programmes for undergraduate and postgraduate diploma courses on its campus. Both institutions signed an MoU for the programmes and forwarded it to the NUC for approval.
However, the NUC rejected the application for the postgraduate programme, but approved the undergraduate programme.
A top source at the NUC confirmed to PREMIUM TIMES that the NUC does not grant affiliations for postgraduate degrees.
“If there’s a university doing that with a college or polytechnics, it’s illegal,” the source explained, asking not to be named as they didn’t have the permission to speak to journalists.
FCAHPT defy guidelines, runs illegal PGD
Without securing the mandatory NUC approval, the Vom college opened applications for the PGD in Animal Production and Health programme and admitted over 80 students.
Sources within ATBU said the Department of Animal Production only learned about the PGD programme in 2021 after the college submitted results for the first semester. By then, the students had completed one semester and were halfway into the second.
Last July, PREMIUM TIMES contacted FCAHPT Provost, Jude Okpara, via telephone and a text message. He did not respond to any. Mr Okpara is now late. He died in February.
ATBU’s attempt to fix the problem
To help the students graduate, ATBU presented the college with some options, which it failed to meet.
First, the Academic Planning and Quality Assurance (AP&QA) committee recommended that the college transfer the students to ATBU to absorb them into the same programme at the university. The university’s Director of Academic Planning and Quality Assurance, Garba Abubakar, a professor, confirmed the arrangement to PREMIUM TIMES.
Mr Abubakar, who said he met the situation and tried to salvage it, noted that his committee’s recommendation was presented to the university senate on 13 April 2023.
“I left the faculty to manage the remaining situation –to work out how their first semester examination can now be accepted by our university and how they can continue the programme to finish (at our university),” he said in a telephone interview last year.
However, this newspaper gathered that the students were never transferred to ATBU, and no academic staff of the department was involved in teaching and assessing them as recommended.
Therefore, when a proposal to approve the final results was presented to a departmental meeting in 2024, the lecturers rejected it, stating that they could not approve results for a programme they had not been part of.
However, after heated conversations and pleas by others who worried about the students’ fate, the meeting resolved to consider the results if the students spent an additional semester at the university. That, too, never happened.
Results from illegal programme approved
However, on 15 May 2024, the Office of the Registrar wrote to the dean of the faculty, Ambrose Amba, a professor, directing him to compile the results of the PGD students from Vom for consideration by the Department of Animal Production.
“Following the receipt of the report of the committee on PGD affiliation with Federal College of Animal Health and Production Technology, Vom, the vice chancellor has considered and approved the recommendation of the committee,” reads parts of the letter, signed by Yahaya Fateh, the Principal Assistant Registrar (PAR), a copy of which this newspaper obtained.
“In view of the above, I am directed to request you to compile the result of all the PGD students who are qualified and forward it to the Department of Animal Production for consideration and as in line with the terms of the Affiliations.”
The letter noted that the directive came from the then-acting vice-chancellor, Sani Kunya, a professor. PREMIUM TIMES contacted Mr Kunya on 17 July, 2024, but he asked to be reached later. He did not respond to subsequent phone calls or a text message sent to his line.
PREMIUM TIMES learned that the departmental PG board subsequently met on 22 May 2024 to consider and approve the results as directed by the vice-chancellor.
The university senate has also met and approved the results, and the university is now set to issue statements of results for the academic programme.
In December, the university constituted a committee to work out modalities for regularising the PGD students from FCAHPT and issuing their statements of result.
According to an internal memo dated 13 December and obtained by this newspaper, the Dean Postgraduate School, Suleiman Abdul, a professor, was appointed head of the committee.
When contacted, Mr Abdul said he could not speak on an internal assignment given to him by the university. He also noted that he was not the dean when the matter began five years ago.
Meanwhile, the NUC ignored PREMIUM TIMES’ Freedom of Information (FOI) request for the guidelines for the approval of affiliations for universities and colleges or polytechnics and the report of its last Inspection and Monitoring exercise.
An official of the NUC’s public affairs department directed our reporter to Chris Maiyaki, the commission’s Deputy Executive Secretary.
However, Mr Maiyaki failed to return multiple phone calls or messages sent to him.
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When PREMIUM TIMES contacted the spokesperson for the ATBU, Zailani Bappa, he maintained the university has not and will not take part in any illegality.
He said the university has procedures it follows for the approval of all results.
Mr Bappa did not explain how the procedure is different from the approval already secured from the departmental, faculty and the university senate.
“What is much concern is whether the university implemented something that is legal or illegal….What I am trying to say is that the management of the university stands by the law and will never do anything that is illegal,” he said via telephone.
“The management knows what is right and what is wrong, and it will never do anything that will tarnish the image of ATBU by doing it illegally or wrongly.”
