President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has approved a sweeping reform of the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) mobilisation process, invoking provisions of Sections 2(4)(4) and 16(1)(C) of the NYSC Act. Under the new directive, proof of compliance with the National Policy for the Nigeria Education Repository and Databank (NERD) will now be a compulsory requirement for mobilisation into, or exemption from, the NYSC scheme.
The approval was conveyed through an enforcement circular issued by the Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), Senator George Akume. The circular outlined the adjustment of mobilisation criteria, stressing that all prospective corps members—whether trained in Nigerian or foreign institutions—must provide evidence of NERD policy compliance before they can be mobilised.
The NERD initiative is designed to tackle certificate fraud, prevent abuse of academic honours, and strengthen the integrity of Nigeria’s education system. One of its key provisions requires Nigerian students to deposit academic outputs such as theses, dissertations, or final-year projects.
According to Section 6.1.23 of the NERD policy, this requirement serves as both a quality assurance measure and independent proof of continuous academic engagement, ensuring that each work is time-stamped to reflect genuine scholarship and institutional affiliation.
Back in March 2025, while announcing the policy’s enforcement framework, the Minister of Education, Dr. Tunji Alausa, stated that compliance with NERD had become mandatory for all higher institutions—public or private, civilian or military. The policy applies equally to universities, polytechnics, colleges of education, research institutes, schools of nursing, and agricultural colleges, regardless of whether they operate directly under the Federal Ministry of Education.
The SGF’s circular clarified that starting October 6, no graduate of a Nigerian or foreign institution will be mobilised for NYSC or considered for exemption without fulfilling the NERD requirements. Serving corps members or those already mobilised before this date are not affected by the directive.
In addition to safeguarding academic integrity, President Tinubu also endorsed an academic output monetisation and reward system for both students and lecturers. This initiative—proposed to the Federal Executive Council by Dr. Alausa—will allow contributors to earn lifetime revenue from their deposited academic works, thereby creating a new academic economy.
To ensure seamless implementation, Ministries, Departments, Agencies (MDAs), and all higher education institutions have been directed to enforce the NERD policy. Agencies such as the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC) will provide inter-agency data exchange support through Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) for validation and onboarding.
Explaining the importance of the initiative, NERD spokesperson Haula Galadima noted that every academic deposit will display the names of the student, supervisor(s), Head of Department, and sponsoring institution. She added that this transparency will raise supervision standards, as lecturers would be reluctant to have their names linked to substandard work on a globally accessible digital platform.
“The digitisation programme is not just about authenticity but about elevating the overall quality of academic outputs nationwide,” Galadima explained. “NERD is structured to encourage better supervision, ensuring lecturers are duly recognised and rewarded while students produce stronger academic works.”
The federal government described this policy as a landmark step toward protecting Nigeria’s intellectual assets, improving educational standards, and restoring credibility to the nation’s academic qualifications.
