The Erosion of University Freedom and Autonomy: Nigerian Experience

The goals of tertiary education which include the university, are well spelt out in the National Policy on Education. One of the basic characteristic of academic necessity motivating the founding of universities is the need to develop and maintain established academic discipline or areas of knowledge and investigation so as to produce intellectuals, researchers, among others. One way to achieve this was to resist tendencies or development that tends to erode their academic freedom and autonomy. Obviously, universities with predominant academic focus tend to guard their freedom and autonomy very jealously and so remain impervious to new development that tends to erode it. The paper, therefore, examine the concepts of freedom and autonomy. The paper equally examines the indispensability of freedom and autonomy to universities. Also, the paper highlights the issues of erosion of university academic freedom and institutional autonomy in Nigeria. Finally, the paper recommends that government should ensure that universities are managed in line with their statutory laws and acts. In this way each organ of the university such as governing councils, senate, faculties, departments among others will carry out their laid out functions successfully, thus reducing the realities that may have limit university freedom and autonomy.