Nigeria’s federal government has directed a nationwide enforcement of the regulations in the national policy for Nigeria Education Repository and Databank (NERD) regarding academic credential verification processes from October 6.
This follows the growing outrage over the abuse of academic honoursand persistent certificate racketeering by some individuals and syndicates nationwide.
The directive was contained in a service-wide circular issued by the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Senator George Akume, a copy of which was seen by THISDAY.
At the end of the deadline, Ministries, Department and Agencies (MDAs) as well as all higher institutions in Nigeria, whether civilian, military, private or public, are to commence the implementation of an intensive but structured verification of the academic credential of all staff and intending staff.
This will be done through the National Credential Verification Service (NCVS) of the NERD programme and thereafter ensuring compliance for each new recruitment by obtaining an instant NCVS clearance affirming the authenticity of each academic credential presented anywhere within Nigeria before confirmation of appointment.
The circular also directed that henceforth, an NCVS clearance becomes part of the documentation for each employee.
The clearance is to, among others, contain a National Credential Number (NCN) that belongs to that credential and ancillary document security codes assigned to each verified and validated academic credential for record purposes.
This major reform implies that each certificate, diploma, honour or award paraded by anybody anywhere in Nigeria must mandatorily be earned from an accredited institution and must be identifiable, traceable, verifiable, and validatable at the click of buttons.
While the nation has had several interventions in the past, this new directive departs from the usual reliance upon the affected agency or an institution, but fundamentally entrenches a new regime of quality assurance scheme that is outside the control of a single institution or the usual culprits.
It invokes Section 10(1) of the Education (National Minimum Standards and Establishment of Institutions Act (1985) regarding governance of national education standards and the safeguard of academic integrity and assigns the responsibility for its enforcement to the newly established NERD which was proposed by the National Universities Commission(NUC) in May 2023.
The National Credential Verification Service is a major scheme in the NERD programme. It was introduced to Nigerians by the Minister of Education, Dr Tunji Alausa, in March 2025, following his successful memorandum that was approved by the Federal Executive Council (FEC) which heralded a National Proclamation and Declaration of Effectiveness for the NERD programme.
In the declaration, Alausa announced the decisive “launch of the NCVS as a systemic quality assurance check nationwide to curtail academic fraud which threatens the integrity of the education sector due to the activities of merchants of fake degrees, qualification fraud, phoney certificates, as well as bogus unearned honours from unaccredited institutions and diploma mills.”
Executive Director in charge of Communication and Cybersecurity for the NERD programme, Ms Haula Galadima, noted in an email that the various services of the NERD Programme are now ready.
She implored all post-secondary schools and tertiary institutions in Nigeria, as well as MDAs and the organised private sector, to heed the directive of the federal government and enrol their NERD Focal Persons, Record and Digitisation Officers on the agency’s website.
“NERD is a quality assurance tool. NERD is a federation initiative. NERD is the federation’s standard for higher education digitisation with the objective of protecting national security and prestige, education integrity, and digitally enhancing the economic values of Nigeria’s education for global competitiveness.”
Galadima stated further that “NERD has other critical responsibilities. But as far as academic credentials are concerned, NERD’s mandate includes the administration of the National Student Number (NSN), the National Credential Number (NCN), and the National Document Number (NDN) to ensure that each genuine award or honour obtained in any accredited institution in Nigeria is identifiable, traceable, verifiable, and validatable.
“Such records will enable NERD to host the National Database of Resource Persons, where every genuine honour can be instantly verified.
“Fake degrees, fake academic titles, and unearned honours persist because culprits know that the process of being found out is laborious. There are so many qualified institutions, even as no one can rule out the possibility of connivance of a few compromised people in some of those institutions.
“What the federal government has done is to create the nation’s official one-stop shop for data consistency that operates as an interconnection of decentralised systems. So, the various systems are still decentralised. Each system remains autonomous. But Nigeria now has a tool to facilitate organic digital cooperation and coordination of these decentralised systems in the larger strategic interest of the nation,” she said.
According to her, NERD’s Governing Council is comprised of key leaders of the various arms that constitute the nation’s higher education sector and agencies with roles that are tangential to data privacy. The NERD Council is headed by the Honourable Minister of Education.
The development will also see the enforcement compliance with the NERD policy as a prerequisite for privileges and services from various agencies, with inter-organisational data exchange support from various entities.
Emmanuel Addeh
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