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From Fred Ezeh, Abuja
Miva Open University has set a target of reaching one million learners across Africa within the next decade, following the admission of 12,260 new students in its latest matriculation exercise.
The university’s Chancellor, Sim Shagaya, announced the expansion target at the institution’s 2026 matriculation ceremony in Abuja, disclosing that Miva’s total enrolment had exceeded 40,000 since it commenced operations in 2023.
Shagaya said the institution planned to establish study centres in every local government area in Nigeria, alongside developing robotics and drone laboratories and a world-class research institution.
He said the ambition was to expand access to quality higher education for Nigerians and other Africans whose educational aspirations had been constrained by work, family responsibilities, financial difficulties and conventional university admission barriers.
“Our ambition is to impact one million Africans over the next decade, and it is not just a slogan; it is a commitment,” he said.
From an initial student population of about 500, Shagaya said the university had grown to more than 40,000, demonstrating the demand for alternative pathways to higher education.
He noted that Africa’s population, estimated at 1.6 billion, was projected to exceed two billion by 2038, requiring fresh approaches to education, skills development and human capital investment.
According to him, the continent’s projected population growth presents both an opportunity and a responsibility to rethink traditional learning arrangements and prepare more people for the future.
Shagaya, however, cautioned that widening access must not come at the expense of academic standards, insisting that the flexibility of online learning should not be mistaken for an easy route to obtaining a degree.
“We owe you rigour. Your degree must carry weight in an interview room, in a boardroom, and in a country you choose to work in, whether that is Nigeria or elsewhere,” he said.
He added that the university would provide academic and technological support, including accessible lecturers, learning centres and an AI learning companion, while expecting students to take responsibility for their academic progress.
To illustrate the institution’s commitment to expanding access, Shagaya disclosed that two members of his household staff were among the newly matriculated students.
In his keynote address, the Assistant Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO), Dr Chikwe Ihekweazu, warned students against using AI to bypass academic work, saying the technology could enable them to obtain good grades and degrees without acquiring the knowledge and skills their qualifications were supposed to represent.
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“If you use AI to deceive your assessors to pass rather than to learn, you may actually get the grades. You may even get the degree, but you will have denied yourself something far more valuable: the education that you actually came to seek,” he said.
Ihekweazu, a former Director-General of the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC), urged students to distinguish between using AI to deepen their understanding and relying on it to avoid the intellectual effort required to learn.
He said technology should be used to improve learning and access to information rather than undermine the academic process, warning that qualifications without competence could leave graduates ill-equipped for the demands of the workplace.
Beyond academic performance, the WHO official challenged the students to see education as a tool for confronting injustice, demanding accountability and creating opportunities for others, rather than merely securing personal success.
He argued that Nigeria’s education challenges, including the millions of children out of school and poor conditions in many schools and universities, reflected political choices and misplaced priorities rather than inevitable circumstances.
“The millions of children who are out of school today, and the poor conditions in many of our schools and universities, are not inevitable. They reflect the choices of our political leaders about how our commonwealth is used and what our country prioritises,” he said.
He questioned the rationale behind prioritising expensive infrastructure and official convoys over investment in education, arguing that public spending decisions would determine the country’s long-term development.
Ihekweazu urged the students to cultivate curiosity, read beyond prescribed materials, question established ideas and develop practical expertise to solve real-world problems.
On employment, Ihekweazu cautioned that academic qualifications alone might not guarantee jobs, urging students to acquire demonstrable skills and show how they could contribute to organisations and society.
He said employers increasingly wanted evidence of applicants’ ability to solve problems beyond the certificates they presented.
Earlier, the Vice-Chancellor, Prof. Tayo Arulogun, reaffirmed the university’s commitment to widening access to higher education through flexible, technology-driven learning.
Arulogun said Miva was focused on equipping students with practical competencies and the knowledge required to thrive in an increasingly competitive global economy.
He urged the newly admitted students to remain disciplined, take their studies seriously and make effective use of the academic and technological resources available to them.
