The necessity and dynamics of public-private partnership in the provision of higher education in Sub-Saharan Africa: the Nigerian experience

Abstract

Nigeria has one of the largest higher education systems in Sub-Saharan Africa with over 360 higher institutions in the country. Thus higher education enrolment has grown in the country over the past few years with over 1.7 million students at all levels of higher education in the country. This growth reflects the number of students in both public and private higher institutions in the country. It is important to note that private institutions have played-important role in higher education enrolment in Nigeria over the past few years. However despite these impressive statistics, the number of prospecting students to the Nigeria higher education system and indeed in Sub-Saharan African countries still pales into insignificance when compared with other regions in the world. Access into HE in Nigeria still averaged about 10%, while it is just about 6% in Sub- Saharan Africa. As most regions and countries in the world adopt the public private partnership to expand access to education, it is recommended that Nigeria and other Sub-Saharan Africa countries adopt the option of PPP in view of the numerous benefits associated with it to ensure a universal higher education access to the ever growing youth population