The Academic Staff Union of Polytechnics (ASUP) has rejected the decision by the Federal Ministry of Education to authorise the National Board for Technical Education (NBTE) to outsource accreditation of courses and programmes in polytechnics to private firms.
Zonal coordinator of ASUP, Zone B, Comrade Lumpye Simji, said this on Friday while addressing journalists at the Federal Polytechnic, Bauchi.
He described the move as a threat to the quality of technical and vocational education in Nigeria.
Comrade Simji warned that outsourcing accreditation teams would further erode the existing standards of quality assurance and aggravate the long-standing disparity between Higher National Diploma (HND) and Bachelor’s Degree (BSc) holders.
The process of outsourcing accreditation is deeply flawed. Many of the selected firms did not even meet the stipulated criteria,” Simji stated, adding that such actions could diminish the integrity of polytechnic education.
ASUP reiterated its call for the establishment of a National Commission for Polytechnics, to function similarly to the National Universities Commission (NUC), and to give polytechnic education the focused oversight it deserves.
The union lamented that the bill for the creation of the commission was unjustly stalled after passing second reading at the National Assembly.
On his part, ASUP national president, Comrade Shammah Kpanja, expressed concern over the federal government’s exclusion of the union from the processes surrounding the proposed loan scheme for polytechnic lecturers.
He urged the government to revisit and implement prior agreements reached with ASUP to avoid further industrial unrest.
Comrade Kpanja also appealed for polytechnics to be granted the authority to award Bachelor of Technology (B.Tech) degrees in specialised disciplines, a move it says will help address the HND-BSc dichotomy and reposition polytechnics as key players in Nigeria’s tertiary education system.
