Professor Kayode Ijadunola, the Vice-Chancellor of Elizade University in Ondo State, has expressed concerns that the academic system may collapse by 2025 if the cost of maintaining power supply to Nigerian universities is not urgently addressed by the government.
Ijadunola said the cost of supplying electricity on campuses in the country was threatening the survival of the universities, explaining that the expenditure had trippled in the last one and half years of President Bola Tinubu’s government.
He spoke on Wednesday during the activities heralding the forthcoming 8th and 9th convocation ceremony of the Elizade University in Ilara-Mokin.
The university don stated that the transition to Band A electricity billing system introduced by the distribution companies was the greatest challenge currently facing most institutions of higher learning in the country.
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Disclosing that the monthly electricity bills had become largely unaffordable, Ijadunola informed that power supplies into the universities had remained irregular and erratic.
According to him, most of the institutions still depend on diesel-powered generators to provide backup power supply at exorbitant costs for the universities.
“The cost of power threatens the survival of the university system in 2025 if the current challenge remains unaddressed by the relevant authorities of the government,” he said.
Explaning that the institution was ready for the combined 8th and 9th convocation ceremony, Ijadunola said a total of 51 graduates of the institution bagged first class, while 196 were in second class upper category.
He further stated that a total of 191 were in the second class lower category and 46 in the third class category, stressing that the graduates were from the two sessions of 2022/2023 and 2023/2024 academic programme.
“We shall be awarding 484 Bachelor’s degrees and 74 graduate degrees to candidates that have been trained, examined, and found worthy, both in character and in learning, to be so admitted to the various degrees of the university.
“These consist of 228 and 256 undergraduate degrees for the 2022/2023 and 2023/2024 academic session, respectively. Furthermore, we shall be awarding 16 Postgraduate diplomas, 51 Masters’ degrees, 2 Master of Philosophy degrees and 5 Doctor of Philosophy degrees.”
He added that the university would for the first time, award doctoral degrees, and by extension, honorary doctoral degrees to “two distinguished Nigerians among whom is Mrs Folorunsho Alakija, who have excelled in their personal and corporate lives, demonstrating laudable philanthropic gestures.”
