JUST IN !! NUC Declares Aisha Buhari’s Certificate Fraudulent

The National Universities Commission (NUC) has disclosed that, contrary to claims in some quarters, any certificate obtained from the Kaduna Satellite Campus of the Ambrose Alli University is fraudulent and a scam.

Deputy Director Press of the NUC, Ibrahim Yakassai disclosed, this to The Nigerian Times when our reporter called to confirm the status of the institution and certificates earned from it.

He said: “It is fraudulent and a scam. There is no such thing like Ambrose Alli University, Kaduna Study Center. The NUC is not aware of such.”

The Nigerian Times recalls that the Sunday Trust Newspaper in the story, ‘Now, Hajiya Aisha Buhari steps out’, published January 18, 2015 had reported that the beautiful wife of General Muhammadu Buhari, the presidential candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), had bagged a Bachelor of Arts degree from the Ambrose Alli University, Ekpoma (Kaduna satellite campus). She later proceeded, based on the same degree, to obtain a Master’s degree in International Affairs and Strategic Studies from the Nigerian Defence Academy, Kaduna.

The NUC in a directive in 2001, under former Executive Secretary Peter Okebukola to all Vice-Chancellors, had directed all university satellite campuses to be shut down. While most Universities complied, few others were adamant, leading to another directive by the present Executive Secretary Professor Julius Okojie, to re-affirm the initial directive that all universities in the country running external campuses (satellite campuses) be shut down.

A satellite campus, according to the NUC guidelines on which basis the illegal ones were closed down, “must not be more than 200 kilometres from the main campus,” “must not be located in a state outside the state in which the main campus is located,” “must have staff of the satellite campus directly or indirectly appointed by the main campus in line with laid down academic standards.”

According to Sunday Trust, Mrs. Buhari enrolled in the undergraduate programme of the Ambrose Alli University and received lectures at its Leventis Building satellite campus, Kaduna.

The Newspaper also reported that she holds a National Certificate in Education (NCE) from the National Teachers Institute (NTI) alongside a Diploma in Beauty Therapy at the Carlton Institute of Beauty Therapy, Windsor, in the United Kingdom and a certificate course from the French Beauty School, Esthetique Academie Dubai. She is a member of the United Kingdom’s Vocational Training and Charitable Trust and the International Health and Beauty Council.

Speaking to The Nigerian Times, a former coordinator of one the satellite campuses of the university who asked to be anonymous, said while some campuses were able to insert records of some students of the satellite campuses into the general students’ records at the main campus, others were just issued certificates without recourse to the parent school.

He said while the certificates of those whose records where successfully entered into the school’s main record could claim some level of validity, the others remain invalid.

He said: “The campuses started in 1998 and were all officially closed in 2002.

“Some of the campuses at the earlier stages would get someone from the main campus in Ekpoma to invigilate the examinations and under some arrangements would then register the students’ particulars in the record of the university. After this, those certificates got a value of validity.

“However, after sometime some centers started issuing certificates to their students in the name of the parent university without any recourse to record keeping and so when employers or schools of post graduate studies contacted Ekpoma for verification, the records of most of them were not found. These developments finally led to the NUC’s hammer on those centers.”

Every effort to get responses from the Registrar of the University, Mr. Ojo Maliki and Public Relations Officer of the university, proved abortive. While mails where not responded to, calls from our reporter were treated with rude and evasive responses. A University officer, who craved anonymity, told this newspaper that Edo being an APC state, the authorities are extremely careful not to get caught in Nigeria’s fractious political party rivalries.