THE Academic State Union of Universities has said Nigerian graduates have what it takes to compete favourably with their peers from any part of the world.

This was in reaction to recent information on the website of The School of Business in Amsterdam University, Netherlands, which said, “An African bachelor’s degree is generally the equivalent of 2 years of academic education in the Netherlands.

“For eligibility, applicants with an African bachelor’s degree (except for South-Africa and Ghana) will need a bachelor’s degree and a Master’s degree in the field of Economics and Business, in order to be eligible for one of our M.Sc programmes.”

But ASUU President, Prof. Biodun Ogunyemi, in an interview on Tuesday said the struggles of the union for repositioning Nigeria’s public universities for global competitiveness were aimed at preventing and countering such a damaging report from Amsterdam.

He said, “Despite the various challenges confronting our universities, Nigerian graduates, who enrolled for higher degrees in universities in Europe and American universities, are excelling in all fields of academic pursuits.

“While we acknowledge that there are great scholars in Ghanaian and South African universities, a close study of leading scholars in universities in the two countries will reveal a heavy presence of Nigerian academics.”

Also, Dean, Faculty of Education, University of Lagos, Prof. Monday Ubangha, noted, “I will be surprised to hear that and I do not know if they have the curriculum of the B.Sc in Nigeria universities. I’m aware we have our graduate all over the world and minimum of 128 credit unit is required for a three-year B.Sc in education.

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“So, I wouldn’t know what they are talking about; I wouldn’t know why they made such a blanket statement. It is unfair. In UNILAG, our graduates compete favorably with others.”

Similarly, the acting Director, International Relations and Partnerships, University of Lagos, Dr Ismail Ibraheem, said, “The fact that they have chosen not to recognise some degrees is meaningless outside the walls of their institution.

However, the school made effort to edit some of the information afterwards.

The spokesperson for the school, Marja Meer, in an online report said the information on the school’s website was incorrect. She also apologised for the inaccuracies.