Nigeria’s Higher Education Needs Total Overhaul — Minister

The Minister of Education, Prof. Tahir Mamman, has called for the total overhauling of Nigeria’s higher education system to put the universities and other tertiary institutions at par with others around the globe.

Mamman stated this while declaring open the 8th edition of the Libsense Open Science Symposium in Abuja on Wednesday with the theme: ”Advancing Open Science and Collaboration:The role of Stakeholders.”

The national symposium was aimed at increasing open science awareness among primary stakeholders in the country, ranging from university leaders, librarians and Directors of ICT.

The event was organised by the Committee of Vice Chancellors of Nigerian Universities (CVCNU) in partnership with Libsense, an initiative of the West and Central African Research Education Network (WACREN) and other partners.

Represented by the Director of University Education in the Federal Ministry of Education, Mrs. Rakiya Ilyasu, said the ministry was committed to fostering the role of science through partnership from shared knowledge.

“Higher education is an education designed to produce manpower for the social, economic and technological development of the country.

“It is however, unfortunate that our higher education sub-sector is plagued with many challenges such as inadequate funding, corruption, inadequate infrastructural facilities, shortage of academic staff, strike actions, brain-drain, poor research, weak governance and insecurity, among others.

“You will agree with me that, the higher education landscape in Nigeria requires a total overhaul so that it can effectively put Nigeria universities and other levels of tertiary institutions at par with others around the globe,” he said.

The Chief Strategy Officer, WACREN, Omo Oaiya, said that the symposium would be if immense benefit to the Nigeria academy space as it would increase the visibility of research in the education sector.

“Nigeria can benefit from this open science in the production of research by the different groups. This will create conversation towards resolving problems associated with research programmes.

“Stakeholders will come up with the kind of roadmap that will describe the work to deliver the goals in terms of producing community driven infrastructure,” he stated.