In the media

A recent report highlights risks of investment of funds into the UK education sector by African elites, including “politically exposed persons”, some of whom have been convicted of corruption or whose assets have been seized by the UK. According to the report, the gap between what west African PEPs pay for a UK education and what they can legitimately afford is a significant red flag. Relatively lax anti-money laundering rules in the British education sector mean that school administrators and admissions staff are potentially complicit in illegal flows of money.

According to a professor from the National Universities Commission, 60% of essays by final-year undergraduates contained plagiarism, at masters’ level it was between 15-20% and at PhD level about 8% contained plagiarism. The vice-chancellor of Delta State University announced that in an attempt to instill academic discipline and honesty, the institution had sanctioned more than 15 lecturers for various forms of publication-related plagiarism. According to a source at the university, such sanctions involved demotions and no promotions for periods between three and five years.

Tales of corruption in Nigeria are many in number. One example is the case of the clerk at the state examinations board who was called to account for the disappearance of $100,000 in exam fees. An analyst of the country says: "There's this perception among officials in Nigeria that national government is there to divide up the booty of oil wealth." That political culture then filters through to layers below, to the point where even local police or school teachers or receptionists at public hospitals may consider it their right to demand bribes. "It's about people monetizing their position in society so that even people with the lowest amount of authority will use that to extract a small amount."

A recent sex-for-marks scandal involving a senior academic and a postgraduate student has highlighted not only the prevalence of the problem, but the difficulty in addressing it in Nigerian universities. In an official response to the issue, the National President of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) said any academic staff member found guilty of sexual harassment, after undergoing due process, should be made to face the wrath of the law. He also stated that those found guilty would enter the union’s Book of Dishonour.