Educationist and former Vice-President Atiku Abubakar has condemned the pegging of university admission to age 18.
This is coming on the heels of the recent announcement by the Minister of Education, Tahir Mamman, that, starting from next year, persons under the age of 18 will no longer be allowed to sit the WASSCE or NECO SSCE, and that same applies to admission into the nation’s tertiary institutions.
In a long tweet on Wednesday, Atiku, who also owns the Adamawa, Yola-based American University of Nigeria, stated:
Tinubu’s policy on age limit for tertiary education admission belongs in the Stone Ages.
The recent policy of the Federal Ministry of Education pegging age limits for entry to tertiary institutions is an absurdity and a disincentive to scholarship.
The policy runs foul of the notion of delineation of responsibilities in a federal system of government such as we are pratising, and gives a graphic impression of how the Tinubu government behaves like a lost sailor on a high sea. Otherwise, how is such anti-scholarship regulation the next logical step in the myriad of issues besetting our educational system?
To be clear, the Nigerian constitution puts education in the concurrent list of schedules, in which the sub-national government enjoys more roles above the federal government.
Therefore, it is extra-constitutional for the federal government to legislate on education in a manner similar to a decree.
The best global standard for such regulation is to allow the sub-national governments to make respective laws or rules on education.
It is discouraging that even while announcing this obnoxious policy, the government inadvertently said it had no plan to cater for specially gifted pupils. That statement is an embarrassment to the body of intellectuals in the country because it portrays Nigeria as a country where gifted students are not appreciated.
The irony here is that should the federal government play any role in education, it is to set up mechanisms that will identify and grant scholarships to gifted students not minding their ages before applying for admission into tertiary institutions.
This controversial policy belongs in the Stone Ages and should be roundly condemned by everyone who believes in intellectual freedom and accessibility.
