The National Universities Commission (NUC) has said due to the huge gap in demand and supply of university education in Nigeria, the Commission will continue to give approval for the establishment of more varsities.

Acting Executive Secretary of NUC, Chris Maiyaki, disclosed this on Thursday evening during an interactive session with journalists in Abuja.

He said approval for two more varsities to bring the number of universities in the country to 272 had been concluded and will be announced next week.

He said: “We have no choice but to as a matter of deliberate policy undertake the massification of universities.

He said what separate the developed today from other countries is the level of investments in education.”

Maiyaki said every year, almost 2 million candidates seek admission into the universities but only between 500,000 and 700,000 students gets admitted.

“You need to see the anguish and the frustration on the faces of families who are desperate to make sure that their children attend university education every admission session. It is very tough and challenging for university leaders and NUC and so we have no choice but to continue to approve the universities,” he said.

He maintained that Nigeria will continue to widen universities access by approving more universities to meet its demands and supply of quality education.

While noting that countries like Brazil, Indonesia and others who have the population not up to Nigeria have more than 1000 universities, he said efforts were ongoing to reposition the university system through transnational education by allowing foreign varsities to come in and operate in the country.

The Executive Secretary said the commission is presently processing applications for the establishment of distance learning centres that will be monitored to provide quality Education.

The NUC boss, however stressed that it does not mean the era of establishing distance learning centres is back.

Reacting to a statement by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission’s (EFCC) inviting proprietors of private universities and other institutions of higher learning in Nigeria charging fees in dollars, he said no tertiary institutions is allowed to charge tuition fees in dollars.

He said the commission had made an inquiry into the allegation and thus investigated but discovered that the said private university was not charging fees in dollars.

“On the dollarisation of tuition fees in this said university, we have investigated it and the university is not charging fees in dollars.

They only charge dollars to foreign students. So I want the media to join hands with us to tell the public that no Nigeria university is allowed to charge fees in dollars,” he said. (Daily Trust)

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