The immediate past Vice-Chancellor of the University of Lagos (UNILAG), Prof. Oluwatoyin Ogundipe, has revealed that 239 first-class graduates employed as lecturers left the institution within seven years due to poor remuneration and harsh working conditions.
Speaking at The Punch Forum on Tuesday, August 26, Ogundipe disclosed that UNILAG had employed 256 first-class graduates between 2015 and 2022, but only 17 remained as of October 2023.
Ogundipe said, “At UNILAG, we decided that those with first-class honours should be employed. What is remaining is not up to 10 per cent. All of them have gone. One day, I asked the man in charge to give me this information. In 2015, 86 were employed; in 2016, 82; during my time, that is, 2017 to 2022, 88 were employed. As of October 2023, only 17 were on the ground. They have gone. Very soon, in the next 10 years, you will have only females in the universities if something is not done.”
He attributed the mass exit to poor salaries, lack of motivation, and worsening working conditions, adding that unless urgent reforms were made, universities would struggle to retain top talent and might admit ill-prepared postgraduate candidates.
“Many of us are tired. By the time you get home, there is no light, and the Federal Government is saying they are giving us N10m to access as loans. You can see how our lives have been devalued. Can I use N10m to build a security post?” he lamented.
Ogundipe further warned that the chronic underfunding of Nigeria’s education sector — with federal and state allocations consistently below 10 per cent of the national budget, far short of UNESCO’s recommended 15–26 per cent — was crippling infrastructure, research, and digital advancement.
He said, “The consequences of chronic underfunding are immediate and profound: Nigeria has the highest number of out-of-school children worldwide, estimated at between 10 and 22 million. Over 60 per cent of primary education funding is absorbed by teacher salaries, often with little left for capital expenditure or innovation.”
Calling for innovative funding, Ogundipe proposed public-private partnerships, alumni endowments, philanthropic contributions, education bonds, and technology-driven investments to bridge Nigeria’s education financing gap.
He stressed, “UNESCO positions innovative financing as a critical tool for bridging the nearly $100bn annual financing gap impeding educational attainment in low- and lower-middle-income countries. The private sector should see education support not just as social responsibility but as enlightened self-interest in building the workforce, the talent, and the markets of tomorrow.”
The former VC also urged alumni to give back through donations, mentorship, and research funding, while encouraging civil society, faith-based organisations, and the media to sustain pressure on the government to make education a national priority.
