The Minister of Education, Dr. Maruf Olatunji Alausa, has asked members of the National Assembly to put an end to the approval of new universities in the country, and focus on how existing universities would be better equipped to offer quality learning with the view of producing competent graduates.
This was as the minister said that the current administration was mapping out a plan to move 10 out of the 15 million out-of-school children in the country back to the classrooms to create opportunities for them in tertiary education.
Alausa made the call while fielding questions from newsmen as a guest at the 2025 Ministerial Press Briefing series yesterday in Abuja, hosted by the Federal Ministry of Information and National Orientation.
Alausa, who decried the unprofitable outcome of having too many universities come up especially at the federal level, urged the legislators to be more sensitive in their clamour, even as he added that proliferation of universities was not the only proof to show legislators were carrying out their constitutional mandates.
He said: “I want to use this opportunity to talk to our legislators, members of the National Assemblies. Please, we need to stop this floodgate.
There’s so much pressure on the President. We have to at least be sensitive to him as well. “They’re passing a lot of bills. Today I can tell you there are almost 200 bills in the National Assembly for new universities to open.
We can’t continue this. Even the ones we have, we don’t have enough infrastructures there. The capacity for a university to admit is not there. “What we need to do now is to rebuild the capacities to ensure that we can offer more viable courses to our citizens.
“We have about 64 federal universities, 68 state universities and 138 private universities. If you put the entire enrolment together, the 138 private universities account for just about 7.5% of total undergraduate enrolment. “Even in our 64 federal universities, the total number of undergraduate enrolment today is just about 875,000, which is abysmally low.
We have universities with less than 1,000 admission of students, undergraduate students and there’s this intense clamour for more universities to be open. We have to stop that.”
The Minister further revealed that the government has put some measures in place to equip and empower Almajiri children with learning and life and skills such as conditional money transfers, school feeding programmes and vocational training programmes.
Alausa, who noted the challenges confronting the Almajiri system, explained that the mallams who teach the Almajiris’ need financial support.
While revealing that most of the 115 Almajiri schools that were constructed during President Goodluck Jonathan’s administration were dilapidated or never put into use, the minister noted an active collaboration with the Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC) and the Almajiri Commission to retrofit the schools.
The minister also frowned at the norm where specialized institutions offer courses outside their mandate. He noted ongoing discussions to address the trend.
On strategies to address the Out-of-school menace, the minister noted the ministry through its agencies was working on the three pillars of equitable access to basic education through an increased level of literacy, numeracy, critical thinking and life skills; increase the quality of education and learning outcomes; and strengthening governance and management of the nation’s education system.
