The Federal Government has dismissed several civil servants who obtained their degrees from private tertiary institutions in Benin Republic and Togo. This directive impacts federal workers who graduated from these institutions between 2017 and the present.
Segun Imohiosen, Director of Information and Public Relations in the Office of the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, confirmed the development, adding that the decision was part of ongoing efforts to maintain the credibility of Nigeria’s workforce.
The action follows a series of revelations earlier this year. In August, the Federal Government had announced that only eight universities in Benin Republic and Togo had been accredited to award degrees to Nigerian students.
This was in response to an investigative report by Daily Nigerian, which uncovered how a journalist obtained a degree from a university in Benin Republic within just two months and subsequently used it to gain participation in the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) scheme.
In light of these findings, the Federal Government took immediate steps to ban the accreditation and evaluation of degrees from all other tertiary institutions in the two countries.
As part of its crackdown, the government also established an Inter-Ministerial Investigative Committee on Degree Certificate Milling, tasked with probing the activities of certificate racketeers and ensuring that only legitimate qualifications are recognized within Nigeria’s public sector.
