By Uche Onyeali
Nigerian government has commenced the sacking of workers with certificates from unaccredited private tertiary institutions in Benin Republic and Togo.
According to the spokesperson of the Office of the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, SGF, Segun Imohiosen, who confirmed the development on Wednesday, the affected workers are those who graduated from the institutions from 2017 till date.
Imohiosen said the exercise was part of an effort to rid the country’s civil service of bad eggs.
AljazirahNigeria recalls that the federal government had in August announced that only eight universities had been accredited to award degrees to Nigerians in Togo and Benin Republic.
The development followed an undercover investigative report in which a Daily Nigerian journalist, Umar Audu, acquired a degree from a university in Benin Republic in two months and used it to participate in the National Youth Service Corps, NYSC, scheme.
Acting on the revelation, the Nigerian government banned the accreditation and evaluation of degrees from tertiary institutions in Benin Republic, Togo and other foreign universities.
Consequently, it set up an interministerial investigative committee on degree certificate milling to probe the activities of certificate racketeers.
Thereafter, the then Minister of Education, Tahir Mamman revealed that over 22,500 Nigerians obtained fake degree certificates from Benin Republic and Togo. He announced that such certificates would be cancelled.
In a fresh update, it was gathered that some ministries, Departments and agencies, such as the National Youth Services Corps, NYSC, have commenced the implementation of the directive.
The Director of Information, NYSC, Caroline Embu confirmed that five staff of the corps had been sacked in line with the SGF’s directive.
“Five members of staff were affected by the directive contained in the letter from the Office of the SGF,” Embu said.
This came weeks after former Senator Shehu Sani raised alarm that the federal government had commenced the sack of workers with unverified Benin Republic and Togo degrees.
