Nigeria is full of wicked people.

How much for Ph.D ?
Politicians with express degrees from abroad.The dancing governor.

Ishilove:
Contd.


https://dailynigerian.com/undercover-how-daily-nigerian/

Holy smoke!

This is rampant this day.

That's error of generalisation. For the fact that a University in Benin Republic comprised their educational standard due to financial gain doesn't mean that all Benin Republic Universities are below the expected standard.

Tokskob2008:
If not for the way our naija leaders completely uselessed our educational system I don't see reasons why any sane Nigerian will go to school in Benin Republic...

What is the meaning of Benin Republic and Togo and Ghana don't have any good Universities in their Country's , OK let some body prove to the all world that this three Countries don't have schools that it is Nigeria Universities that is training their medical students and other professional
Nigerian's whit dirty pride all over the place
And yet ona no go fit sitdon for ona mad Country
make una shift

End of discussion

Benin Republic Universities just like US and UK Universities run 3Semesters in a year including Summer. This implies that 6 semesters can be completed in 2years and 8semesters in 3years.

rayornb:
I've always had reservation about anything coming out of Benin Republic....

I had a friend that got Pharmacy Certificate within 3 yrs....

She was good in other aspects, but in Pharmacy, hmmm

Abeg is it not Nigeria? When everything is paper based. Just get the paper, whether genuine or fake and you're good to go.

PinkNature:


You can actually get a pharmacy certificate within 3 years even in Nigeria.

Stop capping

Bluntemperor:


Wrong use if words,as you should know who is an hypocrite !
You are still beating around the bush- please, Condemn what is not good,as being practiced by Togo or Coutonou!
-Point of Correction-- did Chicago University ever issue fake Certificate? NO.It is a 'Nigerian thing' ,just to call a dog a bad name!
Just like Corruption is a ' Nigerian thing'

I should condemn 6 weeks award far away but applaud or keep silent for a week award of same certificate close to me? It takes a.mental case not to see the hypocrisy in that.
It shows how shameless and idiotic who I have been dealing with can be.

naptu2:
And as I wrote before, LASU appeared on those lists when its law programme was not accredited and it had to stop accepting law students.

https://educeleb.com/only-unilag-full-accreditation-law/

https://dailytrust.com/dean-says-nucs-non-accreditation-responsible-for-lasus-non-matriculation-of-law-students/

I remember that Uniben also once had issues with its medicine programme.

See.the creature asking me to read posts again. So accreditation is now the equivalent of certificate sales to fraudsters?

No wonder Nairaland lacks sensible moderators. Seun needs to read what his trusted allies are spewing. Stuffs even a goat on cocaine shouldnt spill.

musicwriter:
While I appreciate this investigation but I don't like the fact that it has tarnished the image of genuine students in ESGT and in Benin republic as a whole.

Is the reporter saying there are no genuine students schooling in ESGT or in Benin republic as a whole? Why didn't this reporter tell us anything about genuine students in Benin republic?

I've lived in Cotonou in the same apartment with Nigerian, Congolese, Liberian, etc students who school in Benin republic.

You can get a dubious degree from any Nigerian university too. Deal with your corrupt Nigeria first because Benin republic is more sane than Nigeria.

The point I have been trying to make those irredeemable bigots see all along. The ones in Nigeria award theirs in less than six weeks and in fact DSS bursted the almighty LASU doing exactly that less than two months ago. I even sampled the excerpt for these irredeemable bigots Seun pays as moderators. You can see why Nairaland is a perpetual mess.
The shameless one called naptu2 has been getting abusive and all that. He is now equating accreditation to genuines admission of students into a department.

dangotesmummy:
Cotonou,the junior brother of nigeria

Exactly. Nigeria awards same in less than six days yet naptu2, bluntemperor, litmus, pinknature keep talking pure nonsense.
They should deal with the log of wood in their own eyes instead being shamelessly Nigerian.

They run around when the news is about Benin but kept silent for a far weighthier offense happening in Nigeria under their nose. Plain animalistic stuff.

seunayantokun:

Good observation

Good appraisal. Some Nigerian fools are not seeing a far worse report by DSS about LASU doing same in far less than six weeks but want to talk about another country as if Nigeria is not the father of those things.

seunayantokun:
When I first read some paragraphs, I knew it was a special project. Award winning, no doubt. However, he could have added real instances of damage done as some humans have suffered the results of the pipeline of corruption - that would have made it a reverberating 'global noise'.

LASU awards theirs in one week. How about that. We should fix the log of wood in our eyes and leave the speck in Benin's eye alone. Their tears can easily handle that.
Cc naptu2, bluntemperor, litmus, pinknature.

CJStarz:
Rookie journalist! By exposing his face,this guy has put his life in danger. The syndicate may go after him. He's stepped on big toes both in Nigeria and in Togo.

Why? is it for saying the truth .It is good that he exposed them ,this Schools, are a major source of quacks in our society today.

DollarSigns:

You should be arrested and jailed for fraud, what sort of investigative journalism Who asked you?? Can’t you go to the forests and do investigative analysis on the techniques of kidnapping
Nigerians and over sabi

He did an excellent job and should get some accolades.

emdis:
would nysc jail him? Cox that's the consequences of double participation! Or what happens in a case like this?

Why will they jail someone who has helped them identify the loop holes and gaps in their system.

🤣 I have finally figured out what's going on and the reason for the weird posts.

Those people making weird and illogical posts are people that studied in Benin Republic and they feel attacked by this thread, that's why they are trying to turn it into a Nigeria vs Benin Republic issue.

But my posts are not about Nigeria vs Benin Republic. They cannot dispute the facts in my posts.

1) The NUC waged war against universities that issued substandard degrees between 2005 and 2019. That's a fact.

2) It ensured that these universities were not accredited. That's a fact.

3) The list include Nigerian, Beninoise, Togolese and Ghanaian universities. That's a fact.

4) Some of these universities sell degrees, have unqualified lecturers, lack the required facilities, etc. That's a fact.

5) These things are not just from the NUC's statement, but also from the statements of students of the universities, lecturers and journalists. That's a fact.

6) The NUC war against these universities has waned since 2020. That's a fact.

7) Anyone with common sense knows that this does not mean that all Beninoise universities are bad, just as not all Nigerian universities are bad. That's a fact.

No amount of crying by people who feel attacked will change the facts that I have written above. That crying is just a waste of time.

This man that is being interviewed is from Benin Republic and he was a lecturer at Houdegbe North American University and he basically corroborated what I wrote about the university. No amount of crying can change facts. If you feel that this is about Nigeria vs Benin, then you need to read from a Beninoise person that actually lectured in the school.

From boom to bust

Houdegbe North American University Benin (HNAUB) once looked like a promising new private-sector institution, with campuses in Cotonou and Dékanmey. Because of financial problems, it is no longer operational. Karim Okanla, one of its former lecturers, told Hans Dembowski about how HNAUB went from boom to bust. He still thinks that private universities have a role to play in African low-income countries.

How important are private-sector universities in Benin today?

They are certainly making a difference and account for about 20 % of enrolment in higher education. This sector has been growing fast. An important reason is that public universities are overcrowded and do not perform well. A student who wants to attend a lecture has to be there hours in advance to get a seat, for example. It is unfortunate that business leaders are not impressed by graduates’ skills, so degrees from state universities do not always help people find a good job.

Are private-sector institutions better?

Some are pretty good. One example is the African School of Economics in Abomey-Calavi. It was founded by scholars from Princeton University in the USA. Recently established IRGIB Africa University has a good reputation. The acronym stands for Institut Régional du Génie Industriel des Biotechnologies et Sciences Appliques (Regional Institute of Industrial Engineering, Biotechnology and Applied Sciences). I currently have a teaching assignment at ESGIS, the École Supérieure de Gestion d’Informatique et des Sciences (University of Management Science and Technology), which is doing pretty well with campuses in Benin, Togo and Gabon. I could name several other schools with acceptable standards. The scenario is confusing, however, because there are many different institutions, and some of them probably do not even have a license. Colleges are not necessarily good just because they are private.

You used to work for Houdegbe North American University Benin (HNAUB), but aren’t doing so anymore. What happened?

The experience was mixed. Things were going well when I started teaching there in March 2010. But unfortunately, HNAUB was poorly managed. It ran into financial trouble. In 2016, lecturers’ pay became erratic. Rumours of insolvency spread like wildfire. The situation kept deteriorating, and it did not inspire confidence that the university wanted tuition to be paid in cash. Cash transactions often serve to avoid accountability, after all. By early 2018, the number of remaining students had dropped to a few hundred, and teaching stopped entirely in the second half of that year. At least two lecturers passed away because they could not afford medical treatment. Many of us had hoped that the situation would improve again, but it did not.

You witnessed HNAUB’s rise and fall. How do you assess its history?

Well, the business idea was brilliant, but unfortunately some courses were substandard. The background is that Nigeria, our neighbour, has a huge population and is comparatively rich. However, it has too few universities to serve the needs of millions of young people who are eager to get a degree. Octave Houdegbe, the founder of HNAUB, spotted the opportunity to provide education to young Nigerians from middle-class families. On average, they paid the equivalent of about $ 1000 tuition per semester, which is a lot of money in Benin. Students enrolled in business and economics courses paid more, and those who stayed in HNAUB dormitories with full accommodation paid still more. In contrast to anglophone Nigeria, the official language in Benin is French. HNAUB was bilingual, but most courses were offered in English. It grew very fast. At one point, HNAUB had some 15,000 students. Most, though not all, were from Nigeria. After the turn of the millennium, the Nigerian economy was growing fast. Oil prices had surged as a consequence of the Iraq war. The finances of HNAUB were never transparent, but it is probably no coincidence that the problems started to grow when Nigeria’s economy was in recession in 2016. What is clear, however, is that Mr Houdegbe ran his university like a family business and was increasingly absorbed by other issues. He is a traditional voodoo chief, for example, and he became a member of parliament. It is well known that election campaigns normally cost a lot of money.

What was substandard?

There were many shortcomings:

● HNAUB did not have a proper admissions system. Anyone who paid tuition was accepted.

● The teaching facilities were inadequate. The library was outdated, for example, and we didn’t have textbooks. I mostly relied on textbooks I had brought home from Senegal, Europe and North America, or I just ordered them overseas. I sometimes told students to buy e-books online.

● I worked for the departments of mass communication and international affairs. We had neither a university newspaper nor a campus radio station, so we couldn’t teach aspiring journalists any practical lessons. We didn’t even have computers, so there was no scope for any multimedia teaching. I regularly told students to skip summer school at HNAUB and do an internship at a media house or a PR/advertising agency instead.

● Classrooms and lecture halls were increasingly overcrowded. In our hot and humid climate, things became particularly bad when electric power failed.

● HNAUB graduates in mass communication did not have to do any research in their final year of college. After 120 credit hours, they got their bachelor degrees.

So those degrees were probably worthless. Did they help alumni to get good jobs?

The degrees were not totally worthless. The feedback I got is mixed. Some alumni are definitely struggling, others have thrived. To a considerable extent, I think, the latter benefited from their families, for instance by assuming positions in family businesses or getting jobs thanks to connections.

In view of HNAUB’s shortcomings, why did so many students go there? And why did you stay there?

Well, as I said before, there is a market for higher education, and government institutions are not up to the task. Moreover, HNAUB had momentum. For many years, money didn’t seem to be an issue at all. At one point, lecturers like me got a pay rise of 50 %. It made us very happy. We had reason to hope that things would get better. We wanted the university to grow, not only in terms of enrolment but performance too. The institution was generally appreciated. For example, the German ambassador once came to the department of international affairs to discuss international issues with our students. Students, moreover, were impressed by the fact that some lecturers were white people from the USA.

What was the fate of the students who could not finish their studies as teaching stopped?

All they could do was to pack up and go home. They only had their eyes to cry. There is not much point in suing HNAUB. The rule of law is weak in our country, and neither students nor staff are likely to recover any money by taking Mr Houdegbe to court. He is a member of parliament and thus enjoys immunity. Moreover, he is well connected to the political parties that support the incumbent head of state. In our country, institutions do not tend to be strong, and hiring a lawyer often does not help.

What lessons should Benin learn from the HNAUB experience?

First of all, I see this as a missed opportunity. If HNAUB had lived up to its promises – and it could have done so – we would have been training part of Nigeria’s future elite. Instead, the failure of HNAUB has dented Benin’s reputation, at least as far as the affected students and their families are concerned. More generally speaking, I think the big lesson is that education requires very high commitment to the cause. Tuition revenues, for example, must be reinvested in teaching facilities, faculty staff and research. Universities should not be run as profit-maximising businesses, and at very least they must be regulated in a way that ensures that students get value for money.

So you think that Benin’s higher education sector needs reform?

Yes, it does, and government oversight must improve too. However, reform has to be introduced gradually because our capacities are poor and we depend on whatever capacities we have. A few years back, for example, the government wanted to introduce a rule according to which anyone who lectured at a university would need a PhD. That wasn’t viable. There simply are not enough potential lecturers with PhDs for all subjects in Benin. In our country, many lecturers, including myself, have a master’s degree and many years of professional experience. I previously worked for the UN and the World Bank, for example. Policy has to take the existing capacities into account. Change should be based on consensus so it does not cause disruption in this very important sector. That said, there are things that could be done fast. For example, it would make sense to lower taxes paid by private-sector institutions and allow them to import educational goods tariff-free. Benin needs an enabling environment for both private and public universities, so more of them can start to meet internationally accepted standards. Things are not different in many other African countries.

Karim Okanla is a media and communications scholar as well as a freelance author. He used to work at HNAUB and now teaches at other institutions, including the ESGIS campus in Benin.
karimokanla@yahoo.com

https://www.dandc.eu/en/article/why-houdegbe-north-american-university-benin-once-looked-promising-no-longer-operational

Wow! They should have protected the journalist's identity. We will still believe the story.

Do u know how one can work in the radio or be a journalist?

naptu2:
And as I wrote before, LASU appeared on those lists when its law programme was not accredited and it had to stop accepting law students.

https://educeleb.com/only-unilag-full-accreditation-law/

https://dailytrust.com/dean-says-nucs-non-accreditation-responsible-for-lasus-non-matriculation-of-law-students/

I remember that Uniben also once had issues with its medicine programme.

Do u know how one can work in the radio or be a journalist?

Ishilove:
Contd.


https://dailynigerian.com/undercover-how-daily-nigerian/

The real 419

GreaterFuture:

What Kind of Money will Buying/having a PhD fetch you?

I believe they can use it to apply for post doctoral fellowships and/or grants.
It's so pathetic.
I feel pained seeing our educational system in ruins because I know how I struggled to earn every grade in my transcript.

Agugbadin:


Why? is it for saying the truth .It is good that he exposed them ,this Schools, are a major source of quacks in our society today.

He did a fantastic job exposing the school certificate syndicate, including NYSC's incompetence but he did himself a disservice by showing his full picture. He should have blurred his face. That's what undercover journalists do.

Omoluabi16:
So you see? Sacking two hungry policemen will solve nothing. This thing goes deeep. We don't even have a value system here. Everybody for this country suppose get town hall meeting make we talk exactly wetin be our problem.
I wish his face was blurred though

No need to blur anything.
He is an investigative journalist.
Before now, I am sure you didn't know him, same with me.
But from now,we know the name, we can also put a face to the name.

Na so fame dey start.

No be so David Hundeyin take blow?

naptu2:
This man that is being interviewed is from Benin Republic and he was a lecturer at Houdegbe North American University and he basically corroborated what I wrote about the university. No amount of crying can change facts. If you feel that this is about Nigeria vs Benin, then you need to read from a Beninoise person that actually lectured in the school.



https://www.dandc.eu/en/article/why-houdegbe-north-american-university-benin-once-looked-promising-no-longer-operational

Mental case.

After figuring out the difference between accreditation of programs and fraudulent degree award, you switch to epistle in a bid to save face.

Wow! This repoman007 character is really desperate to entertain me. He doesn't realise that I don't read his posts. I hit the back button as soon as I see his name on the mentions tab.

I eventually figured out what happened. I guess these guys that are making funny comments are people that studied in Benin Republic and they feel attacked, that's why they are emotional and are unable to read and comprehend simple statements. They think this is a war between Nigeria and Benin and their minds are unable to accomodate or comprehend anything else.


But that's their personal problem. No one can dispute the facts on the thread and I am uninterested in emotional nonsense.

naptu2:
🤣 I have finally figured out what's going on and the reason for the weird posts.

Those people making weird and illogical posts are people that studied in Benin Republic and they feel attacked by this thread, that's why they are trying to turn it into a Nigeria vs Benin Republic issue.

But my posts are not about Nigeria vs Benin Republic. They cannot dispute the facts in my posts.

1) The NUC waged war against universities that issued substandard degrees between 2005 and 2019. That's a fact.

2) It ensured that these universities were not accredited. That's a fact.

3) The list include Nigerian, Beninoise, Togolese and Ghanaian universities. That's a fact.

4) Some of these universities sell degrees, have unqualified lecturers, lack the required facilities, etc. That's a fact.

5) These things are not just from the NUC's statement, but also from the statements of students of the universities, lecturers and journalists. That's a fact.

6) The NUC war against these universities has waned since 2020. That's a fact.

7) Anyone with common sense knows that this does not mean that all Beninoise universities are bad, just as not all Nigerian universities are bad. That's a fact.

No amount of crying by people who feel attacked will change the facts that I have written above. That crying is just a waste of time.

you are a typical Nairalander. You scream about six Weeks fraudulent award in Benin but see nothing wrong in LASU offering same degree on a cash n carry basis.
Keep allocating schools to people just to justify your errors.

Seun needs to apologize to Nigerians for appointing mod like you who can't reason logically and be unbiased.

But that still doesn't change the law?

Agugbadin:


Why will they jail someone who has helped them identify the loop holes and gaps in their system.

Very sane bro, Benin republic is better than Nigeria, I graduated from Benin republic University, and I serve,when I was, in the camp for my services,I saw so many Nigeria graduates that can't even express their self.
Some can't even speak good English, I even assisted some in writing because they cannot.
I work with the biggest logistics company in Nigeria.
Every country as a bad eggs,even in Nigeria degree are been sold.