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Law graduates of the National Open University of Nigeria has kicked against
the decision of the National Open University of Nigeria (NOUN) to rake up internally-generated revenue of N54.49 million.
The issue stems from a recent decision of the Council of Legal Education (CLE) to offer admission to the NOUN law graduates for Bar Part 1, which majority of the law graduates consider unsatisfactory, illegal, and unlawful.
They argue that such remedial programmes are reserved for law graduates of foreign universities where they are taken through the general and aggregate principles of Nigerian Legal System and Jurispridence.
Problem started since 2015, after the successful completion of the law programme offered by the NOUN, which is in line with prescribed courses accredited by the National Universities Commission (NUC), being the sole accrediting body for programmes run by universities in the country.
It was gathered that after the NOUN graduated its first set of students, the CLE denied admission to them, claiming they graduated through a part-time programme which they had outlawed.
It however took strident and persistent efforts of the NOUN management and law graduates to prove that the university never ran its law programme on part-time basis, but on ICT-propelled Open and Distance Learning programme, which is now the new norm globally due to the debilitating effect of Covid-19.
Even after the NOUN succeeded in getting its enabling law amended by the National Assembly and assented to by President Muhammadu Buhari two years ago, CLE dismissed NOUN academic programme in law as unsatisfactory and awarded Bar Part 1 to its graduates expected to take off early next month.
