A message circulating on social media claims that the Nigeria University Commission (NUC) has discovered and released a list of 230 fake professors in 23 top Nigerian universities. The message includes a screenshot of the alleged list, which shows the names, universities, and tribes of the supposed fake professors. The message contained a claim that Yoruba have the highest number of fake professors, followed by the female gender, and that Bayero University Kano has the highest number of fake professors with 20.
The Explainer’s findings showed that the message originated from a link to a 2019 online news item, which reported that the NUC had uncovered about 100 fake professors in Nigerian universities. The news item was based on a statement by the then NUC executive secretary, Prof Abubakar Rasheed, who said that the commission had posted the details of the fake professors on its website and had sent the names to the various universities for verification. The statement was published in the NUC’s bulletin of November 18, 2019.
However, the news item did not mention any list of names or any breakdown by tribe, gender, or university. The NUC also did not circulate any such list to the public. The screenshot attached to the message is a fabrication and does not match the content of the news item.
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The Explainer fact checker conducted a thorough investigation to verify the authenticity of the claim. The investigation revealed that the NUC’s acting executive secretary, Chris Maiyaki, issued an official statement on January 8, 2024, denying the claim and describing it as “fake, untrue and a figment of the imagination of the author(s)”. He said that the claim was “ill-conceived and a ploy by unscrupulous persons to create in plausible a tone, disquiet, panic and provoking outcries at both the national and international levels”.
He also said that the nation was awaiting the outcome of the investigation into the fake certificate saga from universities in some neighbouring countries, which was unrelated to the claim.
Most of the universities on the alleged list of fake professors have released official statements refuting the claim and saying that they have no “fake” professors and that the names on the list are not members of their staff. Some of the universities that have issued such statements include: University of Lagos, University of Ibadan, University of Nigeria Nsukka, University of Benin, University of Ilorin, University of Jos, Ahmadu Bello University Zaria, and Bayero University Kano.
The names on the alleged list of fake professors do not match the names of the actual professors in the universities mentioned. The Explainer fact checker cross-checked the names on the list with the names on the official websites of the universities and found that they were different. For example, the list claims that Bayero University Kano has 20 fake professors, but none of the names on the list correspond to the names of the professors on the university’s website.
The verdictÂ
The claim that the NUC has discovered and released a list of 230 fake professors in top 23 Nigerian universities is false and misleading.
