Nigeria’s university commission has dismissed a senator’s PhD certificate as invalid, saying the institution where he claims to have earned it is in fact an “illegal university”.
Senator Foster Ogola of Bayelsa West district in the Niger Delta region said he completed his doctoral studies at Gospel Missionary Foundation, a theological university, in 2012.
He said his PhD was on the topic of Christian leadership.
However no research paper or thesis by the senator exists online.
But Senator Ogola insists his degree is not fake, telling the BBC:
The university does not exist today. [But] it had been graduating students for several years every year… If the university is not accredited that does not make my degree fake.”
He says the dispute over his qualification is a politically motivated attempt to discredit him and stop him from running for office again.
The Gospel Missionary Foundation is among a number of universities due to be closed down by the National Universities Commission of Nigeria.
A few weeks ago, a confidential report was made that the senator, currently representing Bayelsa West senatorial district, has fake credentials from an unaccredited university in Nigeria.
“Sen. Foster Ogola has a fake PhD. His official profile on the NASS Website says he has a PhD from GMF Christian University. There is no official site for the university and it is not accredited by the NUC. There is also no research paper or thesis to his name online. Although he got the degree in 2012,” the report alerted.
On his official National Assembly profile, the senator is credited with having a PhD in Christian Leadership from the GMF Christian University Lagos, the same course he reportedly has an MSc. in from the Imo State University, Owerri.
Upon enquiry by the International Centre for Investigative Reporting (ICIR), it was revealed that the federal government has not licenced the GMF Christian University, Lagos, where Mr Ogola claims to have earned his PhD from in 2012.
NUC reacts
The Director of Corporate Communications of the National Universities Commission (NUC), Ibrahim Yakasai, was contacted on the validity of the institution.
“We have never heard of that name,” he said.
A copy of the commission’s weekly bulletin provided by Mr Yakasai showed a list of 57 illegal universities operating in the country; GMF Christian University was not among, buttressing the fact that the commission is even not aware of its existence.
The director also said that since 1999, the NUC has approved 74 private universities in the country and ‘’any certificate obtained from the GMF Christian University or any other degree mill will not be recognised by their authority.”
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Source: BBC
