How varsity lecturers feed fat on postgraduate students

Apostgraduate student of the National Open University, is in a dilemma on what to do to finish her project before graduation time. Her project supervisor is demanding that she gives him N90,000 so he can fix the project for her.

The student who would not want to be named, is a young mother of one who decided to go for her postgraduate studies at the NOUN after graduating with a Higher National Diploma five years ago from a Polytechnic with no job. She tells Daily Trust her story of extortion by a lecturer.

“I have submitted more than five project topics to my supervisor and he keeps rejecting them saying they were not strong topics and he would not suggest any nor say what he is looking for,” she said.

After submitting another set of topics which were also rejected by her supervisor, she mustered the courage to argue that the topics are relevant and reflect the current realities in the country. His reply was: “Even if I approve them for you, you cannot do them well.”

“There is no need wasting our time. I will do the project for you and you will pay N150, 000,” She quoted her supervisor as saying.

“I was shocked and he could see the expression on my face. I asked him, Sir, where will I get that kind of money from?”

After a marathon session of pleading, the lecturer now settled for N90,000. He said he would not do it for less.

She said she realised she had been naïve, having realised late that pursuing a second degree cost more than what is on the paper. This was further confirmed after she narrated her experience to her friends some of whom admitted paying a N100,000 for theirs.

“One of my friends told me ‘you are a JJC’. She said she paid an agent N3,000 to write her assignment and test for her.”

With no option left for her, she said: “Since he will not let me pass that hurdle the normal way, I was left with no option but to go and source for the money.”

Recounting his experience, another student who gave his name as Ifeanyi, a Post Graduate Diploma (PGD) student in a university in Benin said whenever there was an assignment, someone (fellow student) will approach him and say, “guy no show us say you know book oh (don’t be stubborn). We are contributing N3,000 each to give to the lecturer.”

He said: “You can imagine the total sum in a class of 40 to 50 students contributing N3,000 each just for one assignment. Think of the numerous assignments you have to carry out in different courses.”

Ifeanyi said the lecturers will not approach you personally but they all have emissaries who conveyed their interests to the students.

He said for projects some of them will never approve what you write no matter how good it is and will not tell you specifically what they want. They armtwist the student until money is coughed out and immediately, the approval comes along.

“As far as I am concerned, pursuing second degree in Nigeria’s higher institutions is just about having a certificate to get a promotion or better job not about acquiring more knowledge because they really do not care about that,” Ifeanyi said.

Another student who also declined to be named for fear of victimisation said at Nasarawa State University in Keffi, there was a lecturer, who has penchant for extorting postgraduate students.

Being in position of screening credentials for the freshmen, he exerts heavy influence in one of the departments.

“You have to pay N1,000 to get your course form signed. It’s compulsory for every student,” he quoted the lecturer as saying to him, as an MSC student who went to sign his course form after he obtained every other clearance needed.

He said the lecturer had cronies as another senior lecturer in the University gets you to pay N2,000 for a book to get your name in his master list, although he does it under the guise of taking attendance list.

“If your name is not on his master list, you may have issues. The book goes for N2000 and he has made it a must for us,” the class representative would announce to students.

Recently post graduate students were asked to raise N200,000 as contribution for equipping their department.

The PGD students were asked to give N100,000. For the PhD students, some had specific sums to pay. The MSC students were to donate N200,000. That was actually not part of the tuition and the approved fees the students had paid earlier.

A master’s student at Ahmadu Bello University (ABU), who has spent three years in a course of two years. She has not gone beyond chapter three in her thesis under her supervisor.

Narrating her experience to our reporter, she said, “I know those who shower him with gifts and money, and they even defended their thesis and graduated. It is a sad tale for those of us who cannot keep to the pace of his demands.”

Most postgraduate students who spoke with Daily Trust said it was very expensive not in terms of required fees but the money needed to settle lecturers for assignments and continuous assessment as well as projects.

Speaking on the implication of this on education in the country, the Director of Remedial Arts of University of Maiduguri, Prof Abubakar Mu’azu, said such lecturers were not worthy of their calling.

“They are doing harm to the system. They are undermining the culture of proper scholarly research, critical thinking and independent inquiry,” he said.

“They are encouraging the production of low quality, but supposedly high level manpower. In fact, lecturers who collect money for assignments are undermining the development of Nigeria,” Prof Mu’azu said.

The Vice Chancellor of University of Abuja, Prof Michael Adikwu, told Daily Trust that the real issue was that there are lecturers that are abhorrent and do not belong to the university system. “They are not real teachers. A real teacher is always looking for what the students can do, always looking for new ground to break.”

While adding that educational conferences may help to reduce such incidences, he said “those collecting kobo, kobo, in statistics are called outliers. They don’t fall into the true line of lecturing. They should be doing another job.”

He said: “We have sometimes set up committee and we have sacked lectures but somebody must be bold enough to report it, they only go to town and tell it, they should write a letter to us or come and tell us and we will set up a committee to deal with it.”

Similarly, spokesman of the National Universities Commission (NUC), Ibrahim Yakasai, said as far as the commission was concerned, the report was a mere allegation.

“If any student is so treated by any lecturer, there is a procedure in any university and he knows what to do,” he said.

“It doesn’t necessarily have to get to the NUC, the system has the capacity to handle issues like that but, where it gets out of hand, NUC may intervene,” Yakasai added.

He said each institution has its own senate and academic board. At that level, a postgraduate student should be able to cry out when he is short-changed.

“Sometimes allegations are very easy to make but confirming them, like the issue of sexual harassment, they never come out to make them officially,” the NUC spokesman said.

“If any student has any issue of this nature, he should be bold enough and make it formal. He or she should approach their supervisor and report the situation, if it doesn’t change, he moves ahead and complain to the system, there is a procedure,” Yakasai stated.