PDP Senator Caught In Certificate Scandal, Allegedly Has Fake ‘PhD’
A Nigerian Senator Foster Ogola is currently in hot water for allegedly having fake certificate credentials.
According to Premium Times, A few weeks ago, a confidential report was made using the Leaks.NG platform hinting that the senator, currently representing Bayelsa West senatorial district, has fake credentials from an unaccredited university in Nigeria.
“Sen. Foster Ogola has a fake Ph.D. His official profile on the NASS Website says he has a PhD from GMF Christian University. There is no official site for the university and it is not accredited by the NUC. There is also no research paper or thesis to his name online. Although he got the degree in 2012,” the report alerted.
On his official National Assembly profile, the senator is credited with having a PhD in Christian Leadership from the GMF Christian University Lagos, the same course he reportedly has an MSc. in from the Imo State University, Owerri.
Upon enquiry by the International Centre for Investigative Reporting (ICIR), it was revealed that the federal government has not licenced the GMF Christian University, Lagos, where Mr Ogola claims to have earned his PhD from in 2012.
NUC reacts
The Director of Corporate Communications of the National Universities Commission (NUC), Ibrahim Yakasai, was contacted on the validity of the institution.
“We have never heard of that name,” he said.
A copy of the commission’s weekly bulletin provided by Mr. Yakasai showed a list of 57 illegal universities operating in the country; GMF Christian University was not among, buttressing the fact that the commission is even not aware of its existence.
The director also said that since 1999, the NUC has approved 74 private universities in the country and ‘’any certificate obtained from the GMF Christian University or any other degree mill will not be recognized by their authority.”
When contacted to speak on the development, Ogola simply stated that the allegations could be a product of “mischief makers with a potential to foment distraction from weighty matters of state”.
