FG breaks silence on 2,000 universities, 110 fake professors claims

The Education Ministry says the NUC never declared that Nigeria has 2,000 universities or released a list of fake professors, and it calls the viral reports recycled misinformation

The Federal Ministry of Education has dismissed viral reports that the National Universities Commission identified 2,000 universities and uncovered about 100 fake professors in Nigeria, describing them as “recycled misinformation intended to mislead the public and discredit the nation’s university system”.

The Minister of Education, Dr Maruf Tunji Alausa, clarified this in a statement issued on Saturday by the ministry’s Director of Press and Public Relations, Boriowo Folasade.

According to The Punch, the ministry said the NUC had “never declared the existence of 2,000 universities in Nigeria or published, endorsed or authenticated the purported list of individuals circulating online as fake professors”.

It said the fake-professor claim was “a distorted version of a media report published on December 3, 2019, concerning an NUC exercise to verify the directory of full professors in Nigerian universities”.

“The original report did not contain the names currently being circulated, which the Commission has since disowned,” the ministry stated.

It urged Nigerians to rely on official NUC channels.