The Senate has vowed to work closely with the executive arm of the government to mitigate the issue of brain drain in the Nigerian tertiary institutions, with the adverse effects on the country
By Haruna Salami
The Senate has vowed to work closely with the executive arm of the government to mitigate the issue of brain drain in the Nigerian tertiary institutions, with the adverse effects on the country.
Therefore, the red chamber urged the Federal Government to increase budgetary allocation to Federal Universities in the 2025 budget so as to take care of the teething problems of Nigerian Universities.
This followed the adoption of a motion titled “Urgent Need to address challenges of increasing cases of brain drain in the Nigerian University System” sponsored by Senator Ani Anthony (Ebonyi South).
In his remarks after overwhelming support for the motion by his colleagues, the Senate President, Godswill Akpabio said “collectively Nigerians will do something about this brain drain”.
He said there are so many reasons responsible for brain drain. “Some times it could be from several agencies of government sending people abroad for study and because they performed so well, then the countries will offer them mouthwatering contracts that they cannot refuse. That will lead to their staying back in this countries.
“But it is of concern that the state of brain drain is so rapid that it is already affecting the staff strength of various universities. So, we must collectively do something as National Assembly working closely with the executive”.
Earlier, Ani, in his motion said over the years, there has been a significant outflow of highly educated professionals in Nigeria, especially in the academia, in quests of better working conditions.
According to him, this worsened the skill gap in the workforce and is capable of hindering economic growth and development of the country.
Ani said that the National Universities Commission (NUC) report indicated that many Nigerian universities operate with less than 50 per cent of the required academic staff.
He expressed worry that the remunerations of the Nigerian university lecturers was among the poorest in the world, and it was last reviewed over 15 years ago, which he said cannot meet the current economic realities of the country.
He lamented that many universities in other Western African countries have better working conditions than what was obtainable in the Nigerian university system.
“I am worried over the continuous loss of experienced faculty members from our ivory towers to other countries, is capable of impacting negatively on the quality of education.
” This reduces the effectiveness of teaching, learning and mentorship for students in our higher institutions”.
He stressed that the brain drain syndrome in Nigeria should be a cause for concern, as it threatens survival of the nation ‘s higher education, particularly in engineering, medicine and sciences.
