Prostitutes are contributing their own quota to the Nigerian university systems by helping male students get good grades.
According to Alex, a Higher National Diploma student of the Department of Accountancy, who spoke with Punch newspaper, in order to pass a course, they have to pay their lecturers in cash or in ‘kind.’ “The better ones among the lecturers give us the option of paying by cash for the course or finding a lady who will sleep with them on our behalf before we can pass. Passing a course costs us between N10, 000 and N20, 000,” said Alex.
It seems the male folk in Nigerian universities may just be coming to a realization which dawned on their female counterparts a long time ago; good grades can be bought with sexual relations. However, ladies are very familiar with the disgraceful exchange of academic favors for illicit sex.
There’s the coerced and consensual sex, which are versions of illegitimate relations between the faculty and its students. Lecturers in institutions of higher learning reportedly take pleasure in harassing students for money or sex in order to pass them and most students, out of desperation give in to their demands. In other cases, lazy students see the lectures’ immoral demand as a way out, a little price to pay in order to be labeled a ‘graduate.’
With the new expense of getting a prostitute to satisfy their randy and incompetent teachers, education (or the lack of it) in Nigerian universities just became more expensive. One ofPunch’s respondents, Dickson, says he has to hustle in order to be able to afford prostitutes which will, in turn, ensure success for him in his exams. “Apart from the money my parents give me, I hustle on my own in the school. If I want to pass a course now, I need to budget at least N20,000 for it — N7,000 for hotel booking, N3,000 for meal and N10,000 to pay the prostitute.” Dickson said
With the hope of quelling sexual assault and immorality in campuses, the government has set up different panels to investigate incidents like this. But this latest development which happens to involve prostitutes raises two questions – are these panels effective? And, wouldn’t these disrupt efforts to crack down on prostitution in Nigeria?