The Federal Government has approved nine new private universities across Nigeria, including Tazkiyah University (Kaduna), Leadership University (Abuja), Unique Open University (Lagos), American Open University (Ogun), Jimoh Babalola University (Kwara), Bridget University (Imo), Greenland University (Jigawa), JEFAP University (Niger), and Azione Verde University (Imo).
Education Minister Tunji Alausa said the move followed stricter reviews of 551 pending applications, reduced to 79, with reforms introduced to speed up approvals.
This comes shortly after the government placed a ban on creating new federal tertiary institutions.