How Nigeria’s university system fails in administration, value delivery – experts

In the wake of the expressed resolve of the Muhammadu Buhari led federal government to make public institutions more accountable  and responsive to the needs of society, stakeholders are pointing out how Nigeria’s university system falls grossly short on administrative efficiency and value delivery.

Despite lamentations over the inadequate funding of public universities, the public university system is still a huge spender of government funds.

Total receipts from the Federal Government budgetary allocation for federal universities between 1999 and 2009 stood at over N651 billion, while regular intervention from the Education Trust Fund for these federal universities in the same period was over N103 billion.

The nation’s public university system has four basic sources of funds. These include appropriation from government in the form of regular and special intervention.

There is also the Education Trust Fund (ETF), funds from the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC), Petroleum Technology Development Fund (PTDF) and International Development Agencies (IDAs).

Another source is the largely under-reported Internally Generated Revenues(IGR) which include fees and sundry charges and donations and endowment funds.

In 2013 alone, there was a N100 billion intervention fund for federal universities for use in the area of capital projects.

There are currently 147 universities in the country accredited by the National Universities Commission (NUC). Of these, 46 are federal universities, 40 are state owned and 61 are private universities. The private universities do not benefit from the Tertiary Education Trust Fund.

According to the TETFund Act 2011, the Law establishing the Tertiary Education Trust Fund, only public tertiary institutions can benefit from the Fund. Private universities are still pushing for inclusion, arguing that the Fund is drawn from tax contributions from private sector companies in the country.

Ogoh Alubo, a professor at the University of Jos, a second generation university, says, “It is not correct to say there is no proper corporate governance in the university system. There is a council, senate and several committees and in administration, the bursary has its accounting procedures.

“If there are problems, these must be due to the challenges of accountability and transparency. In some instances (VCs and provosts have been indicted) personal interests outstrip institutional interests. Alubo, however, believes that “more demand and enforcement of transparency and accountability is necessary”.

The laws establishing federal universities requires that periodically, a visitation panel comprising knowledgeable individuals should to be sent to these universities to assess the quality of management provided by the governing council, vice chancellor and principal officers.

Investigations reveal that these visitations are irregular, and that undue delays by the government in acting on the reports  of these visitation panels, and the poor compliance level to the recommendations of the panels render the entire process ineffective.

Isaac Adeyemi, professor, and vice-chancellor of Bells University of Technology , Otta, Ogun state, one of the 61 private universities, shares Alubo’s view on the existence of governance structures in the university system to ensure that the system is properly managed.

Adeyemi is however concerned that “sometimes, especially under certain rulers, contracts for certain projects are awarded at source to ‘political contractors’.

He further observes that “these (contractors) do not owe allegiance to the universities, but to their benefactors. Universities have no control over the costs of such projects.”

BusinessDay investigations reveal that some public universities still find it difficult to release examination results as and when due, leading to situations where students wait till even their final year, to discover they have shortfalls in their cumulative grades.

Also, the case of university graduates seeking post graduate admissions going through a cumbersome process to secure their transcripts from their universities does not give the impression of an orderly university system.

On quality assurance in our public university system, Henrietta Onwuegbuzie, academic director, Owner-Manager Programme, Lagos Business School (LBS) says that “ it is obvious that there is a need to improve on the quality of education and standards of infrastructure that obtain in our public universities.”

Onwuegbuzie states that “the orientation and curriculum we continue to use were appropriate for the colonial and post-colonial era, where universities were intended to prepare graduates to fill posts in ministries”.

For her, society has “changed fundamentally and the high level of unemployment has to be addressed by educational institutions, by educating students with an emphasis on job creation.” To make universities properly respond to the new needs of the society, Onwuegbuzie recommends “the re-training of  lecturers, as well as making fundamental changes to the curriculum”.

IKENNA OBI