Nigerian students study in one-block, portakabin Ghanaian Universities.

L-R: A portakabin used as lecture room at AIT and the seven-storey building housing SMU

Sequel to the irregular academic calendar and alleged inadequate facilities, Nigerian parents send their children overseas for tertiary education. The idea is that these schools have state-of-the-art amenities and their graduates are world-class. However, after a 10-day tour of some Ghanaian universities, TEMITAYO FAMUTIMI reports the conditions under which Nigerian students study in this West African country

Welcome to Accra Institute of Technology, a one-block Ghanaian tertiary institution offering first degrees as well as post-graduate degrees up to the doctoral level.

AIT, which prides itself as being modelled after internationally-recognised institutes of technology such as the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and California Institute of Technology, both in the United States of America, occupies an uncompleted, rented one-block building on the premises of the Civil Service Training Centre of the Ghanaian government.

The institute, with a university status as certified by the National Accreditation Board, which is an agency of Ghanaian Ministry of Education, is boxed in the far end of the compound which also houses Ghana’s Government Secretarial School, as well as a Learning and Development Centre. AIT pays its rent to the Ghanaian government.

Interestingly, over 60 per cent of the students in this institution are Nigerians. Out of an estimated 2,000 students pursuing various degree programmes, the institution’s registrar, Mr. Dominic Osei-Boakye, who spoke with our correspondent in his three-by-four-feet cubicle office, says over 1,200 of its student population are Nigerians. He adds that 15 per cent of the students are from Francophone African countries, while the remaining 25 per cent are Ghanaians.

Shameful facilities

To accommodate students for the purpose of lectures and other academic activities, the AIT authorities have had to construct fabricated metal containers instead of properly built lecture rooms. In fact, when our correspondent visited the school, some students were seen studying on the deck of the structure housing the institution.

Investigation shows that most of these foreign students have either been denied admission into the universities back at home or — in the case of Nigerians — the majority are those that have been frustrated by the incessant strikes usually embarked upon by members of the Academic Staff of Union of Universities. And, as usual with foreign students in overseas institutions, they pay in American dollars.

At the AIT, the school fees range between $1,300 and $1,510 per semester, excluding feeding, accommodation and procurement of academic materials.