Chairman of the Senate Committee on Media and Public Affairs, Adeyemi Adaramodu, has made it clear that the issue of minimum age for admission of students into Nigerian’s universities has no place in law of the country.
Speaking yesterday, May I, in an interview with journalists, Senator Adeyemi said that the statements making the rounds on the increase of the age limit to 18 years are individual viewpoints.
According to him, any adjustments to the age limit would require proper legislative procedures, whether they involve lowering or raising the limit.
“Comment on the minimum age requirement for admission is not a law,” the lawmaker said.
“So it is just an opinion. It’s not a law. By the time the Senate resumes, whoever wants to bring that one out to make it a law, will now bring it and then the procedures will take place.
“You can bring whatever to the floor in form of a bill. When you bring it, there’s going to be public hearing.
“All the stakeholders will sit down and talk about it. The parents, teachers, legislators, civil society organisations, even foreign organisations.
“We will sit down and talk. Even if they say that the minimum age should be 30 or 12, we will all discuss it in an open forum. So it’s still a comment which cannot be taken to be the law.”
Only last week, the Minister of Education, Professor Tahir Mamman, had said that the government is thinking about changing the minimum age for entering universities to 18 years old.
