307 Higher Education 14 (1985) 307-319 Elsevier SciencePublishers B.V., Amsterdam Printed in the Netherlands

EMERGING ISSUES IN NIGERIAN EDUCATION - THE CASE OF THE LEVEL AND SCOPE OF GROWTH OF NIGERIAN UNIVERSITIES

J. OKPAKO ENAOHWO

Department of Educational Management and Planning, University of Port Harcourt, Port Harcourt, Nigeria

ABSTRACT The issue of central concern in this article is the analysis of the desirable level of university expansion in Nigeria under a situation made challenging by the rapidly growing number of potential entrants. To identify the scope of expansion for the future, past trends are examined against a background of recent proliferation, by different levels of government, in order to cope with the demand for more places by the overwhelming majority of applicants who are consistently turned down every year. From this perspective, finance is considered as the ultimate and critical determinant of the level of growth of the entire Nigerian university system, notwithstanding the high degree of motivation as revealed by the annual surge of applicants in search of places.

Development of Higher Education The desire for higher education by Nigerians through private studies in foreign institutions of higher learning was one of the factors which compelled the then colonial administration to revise the educational system of the nineteenthirties which consisted essentially of elementary, secondary and vocational levels. The shortcomings associated with this led to a lot of dissatisfaction among Nigerians and this culminated in the nineteen-thirties in the demand for a university in Nigeria for the provision of higher education comparable to the type available anywhere in the world. However, as was the pratice with the colonial administration, little or no attention was paid to this movement until the enactment of the Colonial Development and Welfare Act of 1940. According to Ajayi (1982, pp. 2022-2025), prior to this development, the Colonial Advisory Committee on Education, established in 1925, actualised the colonial education policy by establishing departmental training schools for survey in 1908, marine 0018-1560/85/$ 03.30 9 1985 ElsevierScience Publishers B.V.

308 (1928), agriculture (1930), pharmacy and medicine (1930), public works (1931), veterinary medicine (1935), railways (1936) and forestry (1938). These departmental training schools produced professional assistants whose qualifications were not recognised outside Nigeria. Based on a similar background, the Yaba Higher College, which was the first post-secondary institution established on the outskirts of Lagos in 1932, also failed to appeal to Nigerians. Thus the disruption of the activities of the college during the second world war and its subsequent closure in 1947 went unnoticed since the institution did not provide the public with the type of higher education it had yearned for. What eventually came as a welcome relief to Nigerians was the setting up of the Commission on Higher Education in West Africa on 13 June 1943, under the Chairmanship of Sir Walter Elliot. The Commission was mandated by the colonial Government to identify needs for higher educational institutions in West Africa and its report was submitted in June 1945 (Fafunwa, 1978). This paved the way for the establishment of the University College, Ibadan in 1948, University College, Legon in Ghana and the consolidation of the Fourah-Bay University College in Freetown, Sierra Leone. On the eve of independence in 1959, a more radical development in the realm of higher education took place in Nigeria. This was the setting up of a Commission in 1959 under the Chairmanship of Sir Eric Ashby to ascertain Nigeria's needs for post-secondary education from 1960-1980. Among others, the Federal Government accepted the recommendations of the commission which provided for: (a)

(b) (c) (d) (e)

support for the newly established University of Nigeria, Nsukka which rose on the American pattern as a challenge to the limitations of the former University College, lbadan (now University of Ibadan); a university in the Nothern part of the country (established as Ahmadu Bello University in 1962); establishment of the University of Lagos in 1962; development of University College, Ibadan to a fully fledged University of Ibadan in 1962; the setting up of the National Universities Commission.

It was within this phase that the University of Ire was established by the then Western regional government in 1961 while the University of Benin was founded in 1970 by the then Midwestern state government, originally with a technological emphasis. The second generation of Nigerian universities, namely Calabar, Jos, Maiduguri, Sokoto, Kano, Ilorin and Port-Harcourt were established between 1975 and 1976 by the Federal Government as a means of providing much-needed high-level manpower for the economy and also to cope with the increasing

309 demand for admissions. Finally, the third phase or generation of Nigerian universities started from 1979 with the establishment of Federal Universities of Technology in Owerri, Yola, Minna, Abeokuta, Bauchi, Makudi. This was embarked upon to enable the country to develop indigenous technological manpower to meet the challenges of development. As a complement to the efforts of the federal Government, some state governments have either established Universities of Technology or the conventional types of university to further enhance higher educational development within their areas of control.

Enrolment Trends

Taylor (1970) has identified motivation, finance and manpower as the three crucial factors that determine the general level of educational development in any society, and Nigeria, naturally, is not exempt from these forces, especially at the level of higher education. However, in Nigeria, the problem is not how to cultivate the spirit of motivation amongst the populace but how to control this within available resources and facilities. The high level of motivation is supported by the yearly increase in the number of applicants for first degree places, for as Briggs (1980, pp. 59-60) shows, only 12.6 percent of a total of 115,000 got places in October 1978 while in 1979, 15.5 percent out of a total of 114,397 candidates were offered places. These figures reveal candidate/place ratios of about 8:1 and 7:1 respectively for the two years. In 1977, the year preceding admissions through the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB), 12.9 percent of a total of 96,884 candidates were admitted. This also shows a candidate/place ratio of about 8:1 an index identical to the ratio through JAMB (1978, p. 43). From these data, it is not difficult to realise that the concern in the Nigerian university system is finance for the expansion of facilities, and manpower for their operation in order to satisfy the aspirations of the candidates. Enrolment in Nigerian universities grew from about 3,800 in 1963 to about 50,000 in 1979 (Guobadia, 1980, pp. 44-45). This shows an annual average rate of growth of about 5.8 percent for the period. The figures for about two decades running from 1962/63 to 1982/83 are shown in Table I. In terms of absolute numbers and relative growth, admission into Nigerian Universities is far behind the situation in such developing countries as Brazil where a phenomenal increase in enrolment was the characteristic feature between 1964 and 1973. This led to a sky-rocketing leap from 142,386 in 1964 to 836,469 in 1973, an annual average percentage rate of growth of 21.9, as revealed by Haar (1977, p. 73) in his analysis of the politics of higher education in Brazil. It is interesting to note that Brazil achieved this level of growth after the reforms of admission procedures which led to the introduction of the unified matriculation examination (the "vestibular simultaneo') in 1971. Just as was the case in Brazil,

310 TABLE I Enrolment in Nigerian Universities, 1960-1983 Year

Enrolment

Year

Enrolment

1960 ~61 1962 '63 1963 '64 1964 '65 1965 '66 1966 '67 1967 '68 1968 '69 1969 70 1970 71 1971 72

1,395 3,681 5,106 6,719 7,700 8,888 7,058* 8,588* 9,695* 14,371 17,093

1972/73 1973/74 1974/75 1975/76 1976/77 1977/78 1978/79 1979/80 1980/81 1981/82 1982/83

20,889 23,173 27,000 32,286 39,732 46,684 48,698 57,742 69,725 82,952 92,116

* Civil War Years, excluding University of Nigeria, Nsukka. Sources: NUC (1980) pp. 44-46; Federal Republic of Nigeria (1975) p. 243; NUC (1983) Total Enrolment By Faculty and By Academic Year 1962/63-1982/83

Nigeria adopted a centralised examination system under the auspices of the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board in 1978, a framework which was aimed at eliminating the problem of duplication of offers to candidates, as was the case when individual universities conducted their admission examinations before and up to 1977. As a result of this practice, it was revealed by the Joint Admissions and Martriculation Board (1978, p. 5) that between 1970 and 1975, 9.5 percent of university places could not be filled because of non-utilisation of duplicated offers. Such places can now be filled through the centralised coordination by JAMB, a factor that may have led to an increase in admissions through the elimination of wasted space. Thus, in the 1977/78 academic year, total admissions by all universities through their selection eximinations came to 12,521 of accepted places as against 14,417 in 1978/79 and 17,729 in 1979/80 through JAMB (1978, p. 43) and Briggs (1980, p. 60). In keeping with this growing trend, the National Universities Commission (NUC) made the following projections of enrolment for the universities for the nineteen-eighties, as shown in Table II. According to Guobadia (1980, pp. 53-54), the enrolment of about 50,000 in 1978/79 represents about 0.06 percent of the country's population or a 3 percent participation rate in university education by the relevant school age group. If the country kept to this index, then the tendency was that a total of 120,000 university students would be expected in 1984/85, and 300,000 in the 1990/91

311 T A B L E II NUC's Projections of Enrolment in Universities in Nigeria Year

Estimates

Percentage increase

Absolute

1978 '79 1979 ' 80 1980 ' 81 1981 '82 1982 83 1983 ~84 1984 '85 1990 '91

53,009 63,650 74,200 83,150 91,700 100,900 108,720 300,000"

12.5 24.8 16.1 12.1 10.3 10.0 6.1 -

+3,000 +7,675 +6,810 +2,515 + 1,733 N.A. N.A. N.A.

* Based on 3 percent participation rate. N.A.: Not available/applicable. Source: N U C (1978), p. 75.

academic year. Allowing for an increase to 5 percent in the participation rate, the corresponding figure for 1984/85 would be 180,000 while that of 1990/91 would be about 450,000 (ibid). A careful examination of the admission trends and the projections based on them shows that the level of motivation amongst the Nigerian populace is a positive one. Under these circumstances, the problem that arises is how to take care of the upsurge financially and this leads to the question of finance and staffing.

Finance and the Issue of Staff Constraints

The responsibility for the disbursement of federally-allocated funds to Federal Government-owned universities is that of the NUC, a statutory organ whose functions are identical to those of the University Grants Committee in the United Kingdom (Moodie and Eustace, 1974, pp. 109-195). Data from the NUC reveal that the actual Government provision of funds or total universities' income has consistently fallen short of projected expectations. This is shown clearly in Table III where the trend from 1971 to 1982 is analysed. From the 1978/79 academic year, receipts of allocations by universities have shown a drastic down-turn that were well below the figures for 1977/78 year in both current and real terms. This situations has been caused by the depressed state of the Nigerian economy as a result of the world-wide oil glut. An

50.6

4.2

Total universities income 38.1

Shortfall

2.3

74.5

76.8

1973/74

10.0

105.9

115.9

1974/75

12.4

149.3

160.7

1975/76

18.0

168.8

186.8

1976/77

24.2

180.3

204.5

1977/78

81.6

140.0

221.6

1978/79

Sources: NUC (1978)Table 33, p. 76; NUC (1983) Nigerian Federal Universities Recurrent Grants 1978-83.

3.8 Surplus

54.8

1972/73

34.2

NUC recommended expenditure

1971/72

Nigerian Universities' Finance (Recurrent - N million)

TABLE II1

48.6

185.0

233.6

1979/80

83.4

206.9

290.3

1980/81

55.5

288.0

343.5

1981/82

t,~

313 obvious conclusion emanates from this situation; it is that any uncontrolled expansion of facilities on a free-wheeling basis in the future will definitely be dangerous financially since funds and facilities for any meaningfulmaintenance will be difficult to provide. This same gloomy picture was highlighted by Ukeje and Aisiku (1982) in their analysis of the structure and administration of Nigerian education within the contemporary African system. Closely related to this problem of funding is the question of staffing. Table IV shows the level of provision of academic staff between 1966 and 1982. Altogether, average up-to-date figures of staffing in Nigerian universities show that about 30 percent of the overall staff for the respective years were expatriates, usually employed on contract. The figures from 1973 to 1982 varied from 28 percent to 21 percent. Another factor is that the distribution of expatriate staffin universities is not at all even. Thus, generally, there is a greater concentration of expatriate staff in universities in the educationally less advanced states of the nothern and southern parts of the country. In terms of subject distribution, expatriate staff are mostly found in the science-based and the technologicallybased disciplines although a few are also prominent in the arts and social sciences. It is necessary to emphasize, however, that the proportion of expatriates to Nigerian staff is not a sufficient indicator of the nature of the staff problem in its entirety for, even in situations where there is sufficient local manpower, there is still an appreciable element of expatriate staffing through international staff exchange programmes. Such programmes are normal features of those universities which aspire to harness the vast wealth of expertise and experience dispersed all over the entire surface of the globe, especially in the developed countries. Since such programmes serve to develop the academic and professional competence of participants from a comparative outlook, the NUC (1980) is well disposed to staff exchanges between Nigerian universities and their counterparts from different parts of the world. Although one is not told how the different universities recruited the members of staff indicated in Table IV, it is the general policy of the NUC to calculate staff projection and allocation on the basis of ratios based on different disciplines. Thus current indices are a student staff ratio of 10:1 for science, 7:1 for human medicine and 15:1 in the arts and related disciplines (ibid).

Current Scope of Expansion The question that arises from these difficult financial and staffing problems is, why expand at all? Proponents of growth and expansion readily point at the shortfall in places for those willing and qualified to benefit from university education, as indicated by the number of applicants as shown in the analysis of

1208

Staff

1967/ 68

46.1

44.3

1366 1148

1966/ 67

42

1288

1968/ 69

1970/ 71

35.8

28.9

1 4 7 5 2255

1969/ 70

26.7

2245

1971/ 72

27.3

2655

1972/ 73

27.9

3560

1973/ 74

25.4

3560

1974/ 75

23.2

4055

1975/ 76

25.0

5058

1976/ 77

22.1

5190

1977/ 78

19.8

5575

1978/ 79

23.4

5759

1979/ 80

21.4

6391

1980/ 81

20.5

7980

1981/ 82

Sources: Guobadia (1980) op. cit. p. 46; National Universities Commission (1983) Academic Staff By Nationality, Institution and Academic Year, 1963-1982.

Percentage expatriate 53

1965/ 66

Year

Staffing in Nigerian Universities, 1966-1982

TABLE IV

315 admission figures. Good as this position may be, the strategy adopted by the Federal and state government fails to confirm whether the primary objective is the provision of places for expansion and growth is pursued solely through the replication and duplication of facilities. Thus, between 1980 and 1983, the Federal Government established new universities of science and technology at Akure, Yola, Owerri, Bauchi, Makurdi, Abeokuta and Minna. By this policy, federal universities increased to twenty by the end of 1983. If the still-born Open University and the federal university slated for the federal capital territory, Abuja, is added later in the planning period, then the nation eventually will have twenty-two federal universities. In addition some state governments have established universities on their own to further promote the advancement of higher education in their areas of authority. Perhaps, under present policy, it is possible to venture a projection for the growth of federal universities in Nigeria for the rest of the century. Basically, the projection is that the number of federal universities in Nigeria at any time will be equal to the number of states plus three (the constant three being the two universities to be based in Abuja [Open and conventional] and Ibadan). The implication of this policy of expansion is that present dwindling resources will be grossly insufficient to cope since individual universities in Nigeria hardly generate their own revenue on a large scale. The tendency, therefore, is that Nigerian universities will be operated in a perpetual state of deterioration where the only concern that can barely be satisfied will be teaching without facilities and the required human resources. In actual fact, some of the newer institutions and a host of older ones already have descended to such a state of despair and thus require rehabilitation to function properly. On the part of state governments, the picture is even gloomier for the vogue is for each state executive (governor) to establish a state-owned university alongside an already existing or planned federal university since the 1979 federal constitution placed university education once again on the concurrent legislative list (Federal Government of Nigeria, 1979). Thus, Rivers, Bendel, Ondo, Anambra and Imo states have established state-run universities under conditions of abject financial severity. It must be realised that the economy of these states is in such a depressed condition that they (except Ondo) could not pay their staff, especially teachers, a situation that generated a lot of industrial unrest by teachers who decided to fight for their right to earned income for their labour and expertise (Daily Times, July 2 and 3, 1982, and National Concord, July 3, 1982). In addition, Lagos, Ogun and Cross-River states have also established their respective state universities along the lines of the older ones. It is an irony, however, that some of these states that are unable to shoulder their basic or fundamental obligation to their employees should compound their problems by establishing universities where federal types already exist (or are in the process of being set up), just for the sake of prestige and nothing more. By the

316 time the eight state universities are added to the twenty-two owned by the Federal Government, we then come to a staggering thirty in all, that is an additional seventeen within the four years of civilian administration. This, by any estimation, is uncontrolled growth; hence the situation calls for immediate remedy.

Future Alternatives

Since it is unthinkable to subscribe to the current leap-frogging expansion of universities in Nigeria under the prevailing economic stress, a strategy meant to cater for the qualified candidates that will continue to seek places is imperative. The programme envisaged calls for policy formulation and implementation based essentially on the following criteria: (1)

(2) (3)

(4) (5) (6) (7) (8)

Amendment of the 1979 constitution to place university education exclusively on the federal legislative list since states lack the resources and wherewithal to shoulder the obligation of university finance; Adoption of a policy of the "City" university for Nigeria; Expansion within the ambit of federal universities already existing or planned, while more federal universities should be linked to the improvement of the national economy and the consolidation of the entire Nigerian university system; Acceptance of off-campus status as a pre-condition for offer of admission to qualified candidates; Immediate handover of public and environmental services to either the state or local government area where the university is located; Doubling of allocation to library, teaching and research; Greater involvement of individual universities in admission through the JAMB; Vigorous pursuit of adult education for both occupational and non-occupational needs, as a complement to the services of Open University as a matter of urgency.

Through the policy of city universities, it is envisaged that the campus system with its remote location from the city or town will be discontinued. Thus, new federal universities would be located within city precincts while students would be encouraged to come from their homes or privately-arranged accommodation to attend lectures. In this system, university buildings do not need to form a single nucleus but would be located at avantage positions in the city to maximise shuttles to and from lectures by lecturers and students. Through having a city location, universities do not need to provide their own water, electricity, roads,

317 sewage system, security services and extensive catering services which now consume a lot of university funds. Besides, the need to build halls of residence, with their attendant high costs of maintenance, would no longer arise. As a result, capital works will be restricted to the building and maintenance of teaching and research facilities while staffwould be sponsored by their respective universities for mortgages to build their own houses instead of developing expensive universtiy-owned housing estates. It is through the city university system that every available facility can be freed for teaching and research purposes. By so doing, universities that are now pegged to a student population of about 10,000 to 12,000 students each, because of poor facilities to cater for students, can then admit more candidates and thereby reduce the demand for more places in a cheaper and more constructive way. Through this method, a city university can cater for up to 20,000 to 25,000 students as is the case in the developed countries of the world. This being the case, all twenty-one federal universities (conventional) can eventually grow to the level of 420,000 students while the Open University will cater for up to 50,000 students by the end of the twentieth century. This will adequately cater for the ambitious projetion of 450,000 students by the 1990/91 academic year, based on a 5 percent participation rate as indicated earlier in the article. The challenges of the future call for the identification of alternatives to the conventional university path to obtaining a degree. It is in this regard that the Open University is a necessity. As succinctly put by Perry (1978), admission under this system is not based on traditional entry requirements but maturity and the willingness to participate are the essential prerequisites, while methods of teaching are based mainly on integrated multi-media courses which are devised and coordinated by course teams. In this system, outreach to students is through distance teaching by television, radio, correspondence and summer or long vacation tutorials/courses where the need arises. The present controversy surrounding the short-lived Open University in Nigeria is based on the premise that the essential infrastructural facilities for the successful take-off of the programme are not available. There is no doubt about this but open university education does not necessarily mean education by television and radio alone for, as Perry (ibid) revealed, television and radio are adjuncts to the correspondence courses and not the main media of instruction, as the antagonists of the proposed system in Nigeria would like to have us believe. In fact, the case of the University of New England, Armidale, Australia, where correspondence degree courses are run with a success rate of 70 percent without the use of television and radio is a case in point (ibid). The services of an Open University will be more beneficial if they are provided alongside a comprehensive scheme of adult education or what Tress (1978) referred to as quarternary education, involving programmes of life-long, part-time education by universities for vocational and non-vocational needs of

318 the adult population. In addition to this, Scheffknecht (1978) considers the provision of adult education as a basic requirement in any society, and this could be pursued through permanent education involving vocational training in community centres and study circles for the advancement of community relations, cultural development and academic attainment of members of the public. It is by so doing that one can equally contribute to the reduction of potential demand for degree places through the conventional channels or universities. It was in support of this that William (1978) advocated out-of-university programmes by universities themselves in order to cater for wastage and dropouts and to rectify the imbalance and inequality between different areas of any country in educational development, as is the case between the northern and southern states of Nigeria. For any large-scale programme of adult education to succeed, especially at the degree level, the advice of Reder (1974) for the use of packaged courses, as an essential complement to conventional teaching, is pertinent for it will be extremely difficult to cope with the large number of correspondence students who may need to meet in the long vocation period for seminars, tutorials and coordination.

Conclusion

The main analysis throughout this article has been the financial consideration in university expansion in Nigeria. In order to expand within the scope o f the financial constraints Nigeria now faces, the concept of the city university, backed by a vigorous pursuit of adult education centred on the Open University system, is advocated. Although the intention is to create more places within the conventional university system while at the same time catering for those who cannot afford to be full-time students, the ability to bring these programmes to reality rests on the political leadership, which needs a radical deviation in policy to bring the full weight of the apparatus of government to bear on the identified obstacles that must be removed in order to rescue the entire university system from abysmal decay. Through this, it may be possible to accommodate the yearning candidates who desperately require places to satisfy their future occupational needs.

References

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319 Fafunwa, A. Babs (1978), "The Universities of Nigeria," Commonwealth Universities Yearbook. London: Association of Commonwealth Universities. Federal Government of Nigeria (1979). Constitution o f the Federal Republic of Nigeria. Lagos: Federal Ministry of Information. Federal Republic of Nigeria (1975). Third National Development Plan, 1975 - 80, Vol. I. Lagos: The Central Planning Office, Federal Ministry of Economic Development. Guobadia, A. (1980), "University planning in the 80's" in National Universities Commission, op. cit. Haar, J. (1977. The Politics o f Higher Education in Brazil. New York: Praeger Publishers. Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (1978). Annual Report - April, 1977 to June, 1978. Lagos: JAMB. Moodie, G. C. and Eustace, R. (1974). Power and Authority in British Universities. London: George Allen and Unwin. National Concord (1982, July 3). Lagos: Concord Newspapers Limited. National Universities Commission (1978). Annual Report June, 1977 to June 1978. Lagos: NUC. National Universities Commission (1983). Academic Staff By Nationality, Institution and Academic Year, 1963-1982. Lagos: NUC. National Universities Commission (t983). Nigerian Federal Universities' Recurrent Grants 1978-1983. Lagos: NUC. National Universities Commission (1983). Total Enrolments by Faculty and by Academic Year 1962-1983. Lagos: NUC. Perry, W. (1978). "Developments atthe Open University" in M. D. Stephens and G. W. Roderick (eds.), Higher Education and Alternatives. London: Longmans. Reder, M. W. (1974). "A suggestion for increasing the efficiency of universities" in K. G. Lumsden (ed.), Efficiency in Universities. Amsterdam: Elsevier. Scheffknecht, J. J. (1978). "Permanent education: a European framework for higher education," in M. D, Stephens and G. W. Roderick (eds.), op. cit. Taylor, A. (1970). Educational Development and its Implications for the Preparation o f Teachers. Cardiff: University of Wales Press. Tress, R. C. (1978). "The universities' alternative to quarternary education," in M. D. Stephens and G. W. Roderick (eds.), op. cir. Ukeje, B. O. and Aisiku, J. U. (1982), "Education in Nigeria" in A. B. Fafunwa and J. U. Aisiku (eds.), Education in Africa A Comparative Survey. London: George Allen and Unwin. William, E. (1978). "Higher education alternatives in developing countries," in M. D. Stephens and G. W. Roderick (eds.), op. tit.