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Succour at last for HND graduates *NBTE upgrades programme to degree
Higher National Diploma (HND) to a bachelor’s degree Top Up programme, was designed to facilitate career and academic progression of HND holders, Prof. Idris Bugaje, Executive Secretary of National Board for Technical Education (NBTE) stated this in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Kaduna on Wednesday.
Bugaje, who said that the initiative would ease the suffering of HND holders in the country, was quoted to have told NAN that the August 14 announcement of the one-year top up programme, which could be applied through: https://topup.nbte.gov.ng, to convert HND certificate to a bachelor’s degree, was to ease the decades of suffering of HND holders, adding that efforts were made to remove the dichotomy between HND and bachelor’s degrees without success.
According to him, HND represents the best products of the Polytechnic system, stressing the need for them to progress and study for masters’ degree and Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) degree.
“Unfortunately, up to today, a HND holder is not allowed to proceed for a master’s degree directly, but in Portugal and some other European countries, it is allowed. In South Africa and other places, HND holders are given a route – one additional year for Bachelor of Technology (B.Tech.) degree and another year for a master’s degree.”
He explained that under the top up initiative, NBTE proposed a two-year master’s degree programme for HND holders but to be run in polytechnics and not in the university setting.
This, he said, was necessary because of the differences in vision and orientations between the HND and degree, adding that a curriculum has been developed for some engineering and environmental programmes.
Bugaje said that the curriculum was taken to the former minister of education for the attention of the Executive Secretary of the National Universities Commission, but it did not scale through.
He said that to keep the hope alive, the NBTE had to find an alternative route for the progression of HND holders, adding that the alternative route was for them to do the one-year top up.
He said that with the initiative, they will be able to get a B.Sc. in addition to HND and also enroll for a one-year masters and go further for a PhD.
“If they follow the route of Post Graduate Diploma (PGD), they will still be looked down upon in the university system.
“After they finish the PGD, master’s and PhD, come back and want to join any Nigerian university, they will ask them, where is your first degree?
“This is a very unfortunate situation and NBTE cannot allow things to continue this way.
“We have to find ways for our products and that is why we developed this top up programme with recognised and accredited foreign universities,” he said.
He said that some of the universities were in Europe, some in Asia, and some in North America, adding that the institutions were highly rated in university ranking.
He expressed optimism that the partnership with the foreign universities, if successful, might attract some Nigerian universities to key in.
“The move is not to allow HND holders to stagnate, noting that HND holders should be joining the polytechnics as assistant lecturers just like their university counterparts.
“At the moment, this is not allowed. This is injustice and NBTE cannot fold its hands and watch, As such, we must find ways to improve, and get the HND holders to progress,” Bugaje said.
He explained that the procedure of the top up includes a “credit mapping”.
He said that the NBTE has uploaded all the content of the accredited HND programmes in Nigeria into a software.
He said that the software was designed to pick the B.Sc. content of the corresponding university, outside Nigeria, match them and find the gaps between the two.
“That’s what we call credit mapping. The credit mapping process will now bring out those specific courses that will require you to meet up with the B.Sc., including laboratory practical.
“This is the arrangement being made and we hope the Nigerian education system will join us in promoting it, so that our HND holders are not left behind in terms of progression,” he said.
Bugaje said that those who enrolled for the programmes would get quality education and the fees was about 10 per cent of what they would have paid if they had enrolled for full time.
He also said that the universities have agreed to split the payment into two and pay per semester.
“The Nigerian system has a lot of prejudice against HND holders, and I hope this will change, because it is not going to help Nigeria.
“It is a colonial attitude and unless we change this attitude, development in Nigeria will stagnate.
“I hope Nigerian universities will buy-into the programme so that we can move this nation forward and stop the prejudice against HND holders,” he said.
Justice Muhammad Nuraddeen Bello of High Court sitting in Sokoto State has sentenced three men, including a foreign national, to death by hanging, after convicting them on charges bordering on terrorism and arms proliferation.
The convicts, Yusuf Muhammad (alias Sallau), a Nigerien; Jabbi Alhaji Yalle; and Kabiru Muhammad, were apprehended on 13th June, 2025, by the Department of State Services (DSS) Counter Terrorism Unit in connection with cross-border criminal activities bordering on arms trafficking and terrorism.
Bello, who found all three defendants guilty as charged and sentenced them to death by hanging, while also ordering the forfeiture of all monetary exhibits recovered from the convicts to the Federal Government, said: “The conviction is the latest in a series of successful prosecutions by the DSS in its sustained operations against terrorism and organised cross-border criminal networks across Nigeria.”
The sentencing is coming about two weeks after the Federal High Court sitting in Abuja sentenced each of the five suspects arrested on May 31, 2026, by the DSS for their involvement in the November 21, 2025, attack on St Mary’s Catholic School, Papiri, Niger State, to 25 years’ imprisonment.
Justice Binta Nyako, had handed down the judgment after the men, including two Nigeriens, pleaded guilty to all four terrorism-related charges, bordering on support for the commission of an act of terrorism, breaching both Section 16 of the Terrorism (Prevention and Prohibition) Act, 2022, and the Firearms Act, were pressed against them.
According to Count One, the men were accused of jointly conspiring to assist a terrorist by agreeing and intentionally playing various roles towards conveying 15 AK 103 rifles as well as about 1,434 rounds of 7.62mm live ammunition from the Diffa region, Republic of Niger, to one Malam Ahmad, a member of the Boko Haram terrorist group based in Borgu, Niger State, and thereby committed an offence contrary to Section 26(1) of the Terrorism (Prevention and Prohibition) Act, 2022.
Primate Elijah Ayodele, is on the verge of coughing out a whopping N10billion, if he fails to offer unrestrained apology to Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso, former Governor of Kano State within the next 24 hours, and retract his claim that the former Minister of Defence is bidding his time to betray Peter Obi, to whom he is to contest the 2027 presidential election as a running mate.
Without doing so, the controversial cleric, should be ready for a major court battle with the vice-presidential candidate of the Nigeria Democratic Congress (NDC), the platform on which the pair is to contest the election.
In a letter indicating a legal action against Ayodele of the INRI Evangelical Spiritual Church over defamatory remarks, Kwankwaso, through Magaji Mato Ibrahim, SAN & Co., his lawyers demanded an immediate retraction and apology from the cleric over the allegations.
Details of the letter, dated June 11, and unveiled through the X platform of the legal team, was based on a viral video recorded during a live-streamed church service, where the preacher made allegations targeting Kwankwaso’s integrity as Peter Obi’s running mate under the NDC.
Quoting the cleric as stating: “KWANKWASO IS A FAKE TO OBI, KWANKWASO WILL BETRAY YOU. KWANKWASO HAS BEEN PAID TO BE VICE PRESIDENT TO OBI AMONG OTHER LIBELOUS COMMENTS WHILE PRETENDING TO BE A PREACHER,” the former governor said the comments were unprovoked, grossly unfounded, and carefully designed to create a rift within the ranks of the political party and its supporters.
Handing Ayodele a 24-hour ultimatum to publish a full and unequivocal retraction across all social media platforms and news outlets with the same prominence as the original video, they also demanded a written undertaking that he would cease and desist from making any further malicious statements against their client, warning that failure to comply, would lead to full legal actions.
The letter stated: “We shall claim substantial damages to the tune of Ten Billion Naira and cost of the action on a full indemnity basis amongst other reliefs.”
President Bola Ahmed Tinubu on Tuesday demanded the immediate end to the exportation of minerals from countries in Africa in their raw forms, which he said had led to massive exploitation of the continent.
The President, told member countries of the African Minerals Strategy Group (AMSG), a forum of Ministers in charge of Mining and Solid Minerals on the continent to speak with one voice to promote, collective interests, ensure value addition, and prevent the continent from becoming merely a source of raw materials for the rest of the world.
As the Grand Patron of the group, chaired by Dele Alake, Nigeria’s Minister of Solid Minerals Development, gave the charge while receiving a delegation of AMSG in the State House, Tinubu told the delegation that the group had a critical role to play in strengthening Africa’s bargaining power in the global mineral market and ensuring that the continent derives maximum value from its natural resources.
His words: “ What we should do is avoid bureaucracy and deceit; we must put an end to exploitation. The rest of the world won’t mind if your country is a cesspit of dams and rubbish and excavates your raw materials without giving value.
“It is our responsibility to collaborate and cooperate to ensure that these metals and minerals bring value to us, bring technology to us, and we can do it. It is how much each country will put into the research, development and refinery. I don’t see reasons we cannot demand centralisation of that conversation somewhere on the continent. So why not utilise that in our research and development and knowledge-based economy to enhance the quality of life and bring prosperity to our people.”
Emphasising that Africa possessed enormous mineral wealth that should be strategically harnessed to drive industrialisation, create jobs and accelerate economic transformation across the continent, the President, said the era of exporting raw minerals without local processing and beneficiation must give way to a new model that encourages investment in local industries, technology transfer and the development of value chains that retain wealth within Africa.
Alake, who had earlier expressed gratitude to the President for his exemplary leadership under the Renewed Hope Agenda, said the gesture had shown support for Nigeria’s mineral sector, especially in the local value-addition and economic diversification drive, where artisanal miners are empowered.
He told the President: “You encouraged us to look at the focal point of the establishment of this group, which is to ensure that the African natural resources, especially with regards to minerals, critical matters, are localised, the beneficiation coming directly to Africans generally.
“You charged us that we should set our sails very high and ensure that local value addition is a pivot around which all the objectives of this organisation should revolve.
“So, sir, we have gone implemented your charge and we are quitted that today local value addition is reverberating all over Africa.”
He added that some member countries have gone ahead to ban the export of raw minerals.
He explained members of the body were in Abuja for the Fifth edition of the African Natural Resources and Energy Investment Summit (AFNIS 2026), to push for a new continental approach to resource management and industrial development.
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