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The Minister of Education, Tunji Alausa, has revealed that a federal university in Nigeria has about 1,200 staff members despite having less than 800 students.
Mr Alausa’s comments came as he tried to justify the Nigerian government’s decision to place a seven-year ban on the establishment of additional federal tertiary institutions.
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Speaking after the Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting held at the presidential villa on Wednesday, the minister described such situations as a waste of government resources.
“Let me give you specific examples of one university in one of the regions in the country. They have less than 800 students, and they have a staff strength of 1200,” he said.
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“This is the commonality in our federal institutions. Several federal universities today have less than 2000 students. So, it’s just a waste of government resources.”
Mr Alausa did not name the university. However, it is likely to be one of the newly established federal universities.
PREMIUM TIMES reported how the government created more than eight universities in less than two years.
He said the challenge with Nigeria’s tertiary institutions was not access, noting that the government would rather improve the quality of the existing ones.
Mr Alausa had directed the Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFund), an intervention agency for Nigerian tertiary institutions, to use the institutions’ 2025 funding for the rehabilitation of existing infrastructure.
The minister earlier decried the proliferation of bills for the creation of universities at the National Assembly, calling on the lawmakers to stop considering such bills.
According to him, there were over 200 bills seeking the creation of federal universities in parts of the country.
Funding crisis in tertiary institutions
Meanwhile, the existing Nigerian tertiary institutions currently struggle with underfunding from the federal government.
The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), the largest lecturers’ union in the country, had routinely decried the proliferation of universities.
ASUU said the government had developed a habit of establishing universities, leaving their funding entirely to TETFund, straining the intervention agency’s resources.
Also, persistent underfunding has remained a key source of conflict between university workers and the government.
ASUU recently warned of an imminent strike over the government’s failure to conclude the renegotiation of an agreement with the union.
READ ALSO: SPECIAL REPORT: Despite huge investments, Nigeria’s rice production can’t meet local consumption
The agreement, which largely covers funding for the universities and the academics’ welfare, was first signed in 2009 with an agreement of a period of renegotiation.
However, renegotiation efforts in 2013, 2017, 2020, 2021, and 2024 have stalled with successive governments failing to sign the draft agreements.
The last committee, inaugurated in October 2024 and chaired by the Pro-Chancellor of the Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, Yayale Ahmed, submitted its draft report to the government eight months ago.
But the government has yet to sign or begin the implementation.
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