Higher Education in Africa and the Role of Private Universities: A Focus on Nigeria

Abstract

This paper is an exploratory study that focuses on the problems facing higher education in Africa and the role of Private Universities with particular focus on Nigeria. The Nigerian Educational System is today bedeviled by series of challenges such as issues of inadequate funding, inconsistent policy changes and lack of continuity of programmes which are more pronounced in Public Universities (both Federal and State owned). Other issues include infrastructural decay and the disruption of the higher education system and academic calendars due to strikes and riots. Insufficient budgetary allocation, obsolete equipment, old and outdated curricula and text books, lack of research grants, poor remuneration and general welfare for Lecturers including the heightened level of brain drain. The current discuss on this issue is in line with the incessant complaints by Employers of Labour that most Nigerian Graduates are half baked needing a lot of training in the world of work. Private Universities such as Covenant University emerged to salvage the situation bearing in mind the fact that education remains the engine that drives the growth and development of a Nation. The emphasis here is on the emergence of Private Universities in Nigeria, how well they have faired, current challenges and prospects for future development.