The Vice President, Professor Yemi Osinbajo, disclosed this on Monday at the unveiling of the new curriculum in Abuja.

Osibanjo said the development was part of efforts geared toward making university education become more responsive to the pressing needs of society.

Professor Osinbajo was represented at the unveiling by the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Boss Mustapha.

He explained that the introduction of the Core Curriculum and Minimum Standard to university education will address local issues, meet international standards and uplift scholarship in Nigerian universities.

The Vice president also commended the NUC for the unbundling of such disciplines as Agriculture and the emergence of three courses – Allied Health Sciences, Architecture and Communication, and media studies – the three new courses in Nigerian Universities.

“This document has indeed taken cognizance of the need to provide greater academic autonomy to universities with regards to the development of some percentage of course content.

“I commend the commission of this decision to share the minimum credit unit required for graduation in the Nigerian university in the ratio of 70 to 30 per cent. This will further create institutional peculiarity,” he said.

Speaking also at the event, Prof. Abubakar Rasheed, the Executive Secretary of the National Universities Commission, said the commission has commenced the journey to restructure the Benchmark for Minimum Academic Standards BMAS in 2018, saying that it has introduced in its place, the Core Curriculum and Minimum Academic Standards (CCMAS).

He added that the new CCMAS is a product of sustained stakeholder interactions over two years.

The union said this is necessary in order to get better conditions of service for lecturers and improve access to quality education in the country.

The union on Wednesday described the statement credited to the pro-chancellor of Osun State University, Mallam Yusuf Alli as unfortunate.

Recall that Alli had said it was wrong for the Federal Government to negotiate with ASUU.

But, ASUU while reacting, said Nigerian academics cannot be asked to earn by their performance when basic infrastructures for teaching and research are not available.

Ibadan Zonal Coordinator of ASUU, Professor Oyebamiji Oyegoke, and Professor Ayoola Akinwole (UI), Professor Moyosore Ajao (UNILORIN), Professor Biodun Olaniran (LAUTECH), Dr. Shehu Salau (KWASU), Dr. Wende Olaosebikan (UNIOSUN) in a jointly signed statement explained that they were surprised that the UNIOSUN pro-chancellor is unaware that pro-chancellors have always been part of the negotiations.

The union in the statement on Wednesday said asking a union like ASUU to negotiate with councils shows a capitalist mindset of people who want the children of the masses to be denied access to quality public education.

They added that they will continue to resist any attempt to further pauperise lecturers.

The union maintained that they will not allow anyone to subject them to the whims and caprices of the chairmen of the council.

The union said, “The Pro – chancellor and chairman of the council, Osun State University, Mallam Yusuf Alli by his statement that ‘it is wrong for the Federal Government of Nigeria to negotiate with ASUU is a regurgitation of non-practicable views of some detractors of public university in Nigeria.

“Like ASUU has pointed out severally, these are words that do not take the social and economic issues of the Nigerian state into a realistic consideration.

“How can he say councils that cannot develop infrastructure in university except through ASUU agitation for university revitalisation and intervention of TETFUND should be negotiating workers’ salary?”

The motion to probe this was moved by the Chairman of the House Committee on Basic Education, Prof Julius Ihonvbere, at the plenary on Wednesday.

The motion was titled, ‘Need to Investigate the Acceptance Fees Charged by Tertiary Institutions in Nigeria.’

Moving the motion, Ihonvbere said, “The House notes that the arbitrary high acceptance fees charged by some public universities on new students across the country have become a matter of great concern to many families.

“The House also notes that amid the rising frustrations over the exorbitant fees, indigent families of new students that are forced to pay the acceptance fees are bemoaning the unusual astronomical increases against the backdrop of the fact that Federal Universities are supposedly tuition-free.

“The House is aware that the acceptance fees are discriminatory, as they vary from one university to the other, which clearly shows that they have become mere internal revenue-generating mechanisms thus constituting an impediment to the smooth process of entry into universities.”

Ihonvbere stated, “If the situation is unchecked, acceptance fees may surreptitiously become the school fee, thus affecting the number of students that may gain entry into higher institutions in Nigeria. The House is worried that the dire consequences of exorbitant acceptance fees in our public universities have led to many indigent students losing their admission as a result of their inability to afford the fees.”

Adopting the motion, the House urged the Federal Government to “increase the funding of public universities to moderate the excessive drive for Internally Generated Revenue at the expense of popular access to public education in Nigeria.”

The House also mandated the Committee on Tertiary Institutions and Services to “investigate the high acceptance fees charged by Tertiary Institutions in Nigeria and report back within four weeks for further legislative action.”

According to the union, the Federal Government must first met its demands before considering reopening of institutions after it was shut down for more than six months following the coronavirus outbreak.

It added that it would unfold its next agenda if the Federal Government refused to negotiate the 2009 agreement signed by both parties.

Meanwhile, the ASUU National President, Prof. Biodun Ogunyemi, while speaking at a town meeting at the African Hall in the University of Ilorin, however, refused to state what was in the agenda.“

I think it is better we wait. When we get to that bridge, we will cross it. I can’t open our strategy here; whatever you do is about strategy; let the government refuse to negotiate, we will unfold our strategy then,” Ogunyemi said,

He stated that the union had in March went on strike because of the government’s insensitivity to university education, adding that some of ASUU’s demands included funding of university education, which the government had reneged on in the last 10 years.

“There is a deliberate attempt to kill university education in the country. Some universities use stoves in their laboratories instead of burners and buckets to fetch water to perform experiments; it’s as bad as that,” he said.

He explained that ASUU had signed MoU with the Federal Government on the need to improve facilities on the campuses, students’ welfare, promotion, and welfare, which were ignored “because there are plans to make education inaccessible to children of the poor, which today is creating social vices such as Yahoo-Yahoo, Yahoo-plus, banditry, and other criminal activities in the society.

“Check the social media; you will see them celebrating their children graduating from foreign universities. This is why they are not willing to fund public universities”, the ASUU president said.

The union said that it had offered to be given the opportunity to develop an alternative to IPPIS.

The Zonal Coordinator of the union in Owerri Zone, Comrade Uzo Onyebinama, said this on Monday at a press conference held at the Imo State University (IMSU) Owerri.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the press conference was at the instance of Chairpersons of five ASUU unions in Chukwuemeka Odimegwu Ojukwu University, Igboaram and the Federal University of Technology Owerri (FUTO).

Others are IMSU, Owerri, Nnamdi Asikiwe University, Awka and Michael Okpara University of Agriculture, Umudike.

He said the press conference was called to draw attention to burning issues that might lead to a breach of the industrial harmony in universities and cripple academic and research activities.

According to Onyebinama, IPPIS violates university autonomy and FGN/ASUU agreement and did not address the peculiarity inherent in the nature and structure of universities.

“Specifically, IPPIS violates and erodes university autonomy inherent in the extent provisions of section 2AA of the Universities Miscellaneous Provision (Amendement) Act 2003,” he said.

The ASUU zonal coordinator said that academic activities (teaching, research and community service) in universities had specific milestones with timelines.

“Universities are structured to be independent and free from civil service bureaucracy.

“As a result, university establishment is not only flexible and dynamic but also pragmatic with the primary objectives of rapid response to critical exigencies. IPPIS negates this.

“The Union views the claim by the Accountant-General of the Federation (OAGF) that ASUU’s position against IPPIS is an endorsement of corruption as cheap blackmail.

“ASUU cannot be blackmailed into shirking her sacred responsibility of defending the autonomy of the universities.

“ASUU’s zero tolerance for corruption (individual and institutional) is widely acclaimed. The union has offered to be given the opportunity to develop an alternative to IPPIS,” he said.

Onyebinama said that the union had been clamouring for constitution of statutory visitation panels to federal universities that was long overdue, adding that visitation panels provided the platform for inquiring into the conduct of affairs of universities.

He said that the failure of the Federal Government to inquire into the affairs of universities through the instrument of visitation panels was the real endorsement of corruption.

On the 2009 FGN/ASUU Agreement, he said that the attempt at the renegotiation which ought to have been renegotiated in 2012, had failed due to what he called high handedness of a team formed by government.

He alleged that the team acted out of a script deliberately designed to frustrate the renegotiation exercise.

“For 10 years, the salaries and allowance of staff members have remained constant, double digit inflation and the devaluation of the naira notwithstanding.

“We are, therefore, using this opportunity and the medium of the press to call on well-meaning Nigerians to prevail on the FG to rescind the forceful and compulsory enrollment of universities into IPPIS.

“It should also ensure that the renegotiation of the 2009 FGN/ASUU Agreement is concluded without further delay. A stitch in time clearly saves nine.

“Our universities surely need a break from incessant industrial crisis caused by government insensitivity,” he said.