By Jemimah Wellington, JKNewsMedia Correspondent
GRADUATES SEEKING mobilisation into the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) will from October 6, 2025, be required to provide proof of compliance with the Nigeria Education Repository and Databank (NERD) policy before they can be mobilised or granted exemption, according to a directive issued by the Federal Government.
The new directive, approved by President Bola Tinubu under provisions of the NYSC Act, makes compliance with the NERD policy a compulsory requirement for all graduates, whether from Nigerian universities, polytechnics, colleges of education, or overseas institutions.
The directive was conveyed through an enforcement circular issued by the Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), Senator George Akume, in line with Sections 2(4)(4) and 16(1)(C) of the Act.
According to the SGF’s circular, the reform forms part of broader measures aimed at curbing certificate racketeering, ending the abuse of honorary qualifications, and creating a verifiable record of academic achievements across the country.
Students will now be mandated to deposit academic outputs, including final year projects, theses, and dissertations, into the national repository.
Section 6.1.23 of the NERD policy also outlines the deposit requirement as “a quality assurance check and a yearly independent proof of continuous academic enrolment and affiliation,” with the intention of time-stamping academic work to establish authenticity and traceability.
The directive further clarified a policy position previously announced by the Minister of Education, Dr. Tunji Alausa, who had earlier stated that submission of academic outputs into the NERD system would become obligatory.
The SGF’s circular confirmed that without compliance, no Nigerian graduate would be mobilised or exempted from the NYSC after the enforcement date.
The Federal Government also approved a monetisation and reward mechanism for academic outputs deposited under the NERD programme.
The scheme, presented to the Federal Executive Council by the Education Minister, will allow students and their lecturers to earn lifetime revenues from academic works deposited in the repository.
Higher institutions have also been encouraged to set up local repositories to feed into the national system.
NERD spokesperson, Haula Galadima, explained that each deposited academic work will be documented with the full names of the student, supervisor, co-supervisor, and Head of Department, along with the sponsoring institution and department.
She said the policy aims to promote higher academic standards by making the identities of supervisors and contributors visible on a globally accessible platform.
“Very few lecturers would want their names associated with poorly produced academic works. By making supervision records transparent, NERD strengthens academic integrity and encourages thorough supervision,” Galadima noted.
She added that the digitisation programme is designed to raise the overall quality of academic content, presentation, and output across Nigerian institutions.
By centralising intellectual works that previously gathered dust in libraries, the initiative will also provide researchers, industries, and policymakers with accessible data that could drive national development in agriculture, medicine, engineering, governance, and other fields.
The SGF’s circular also directed Ministries, Departments, and Agencies (MDAs), as well as higher education institutions, to fully enforce the NERD policy.
Critical data agencies, including the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC), are required to support the integration process through Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) that will facilitate onboarding and data validation.
To ensure compliance, all organisations and higher institutions will now be required to file annual compliance reports with NERD from March 30 each year.
This monitoring and evaluation mechanism will strengthen accountability and ensure the sustainability of the programme.
The government explained that the NYSC will play a new role as a quality assurance checkpoint in the implementation of the NERD policy.
By requiring proof of repository submission before mobilisation, the scheme will help validate the authenticity of academic qualifications and integrate graduates into a system that preserves Nigeria’s intellectual capital.
The circular clarified that the new directive will not affect current corps members or graduates already mobilised before October 6. It applies strictly to graduates seeking mobilisation or exemption from that date onwards.
In March this year, while announcing the policy’s approval, Education Minister Alausa stressed that its provisions would become binding across the board. He cited Sections 2.3, 4.3(1), and 7.6.11(c) of the NERD guidelines as the basis for the mandatory submission requirement.
A copy of the policy document also revealed that the Federal Government’s decision was anchored on addressing decades of intellectual waste.
Thousands of student projects, theses, and research outputs have remained unused in library shelves, leaving valuable insights untapped.
By digitising these works, the government aims to secure Nigeria’s intellectual property, strengthen supervision standards, and bolster the credibility of academic qualifications.
The policy also seeks to create a collaborative framework among institutions, replacing the silo approach in which universities and colleges had previously operated.
With a structured national repository, Nigeria will be better positioned to harness academic research outputs for economic, technological, and social development.
The circular from the SGF also noted that the NERD policy aligns with the administration’s drive to strengthen higher education credibility, promote transparency in academic qualifications, and secure the country’s intellectual heritage.
