Akwa Ibom varsity secures law accreditation months after governor's misleading claim

Eight months after Akwa Ibom State Governor Umo Eno attributed the approval of a law program at Akwa Ibom State University (AKSU) to his defection to the All Progressives Congress (APC), the university has finally secured accreditation from the Council of Legal Education.

AKSU now appears on the Council of Legal Education’s official list of institutions authorized to admit students into the Bachelor of Law (LL.B.) program. The council's notice, dated August 14, 2026, includes AKSU among 122 approved universities in Nigeria. This development follows repeated omissions of AKSU from earlier lists, despite the university having received prior approval from the National Universities Commission (NUC) for its law program.

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What just happened takes a lot of relationship building and relationship management to get those things into our state.

The situation brings renewed scrutiny to Governor Eno's November 2025 assertion. At a meeting with political appointees, Eno claimed his switch to the APC-led federal government facilitated the approval of AKSU's law faculty, alongside other federal projects like the Renewed Hope housing estate. He argued that remaining in an opposition party would hinder the state's ability to secure federal assistance.

However, an examination of the timeline revealed that the NUC's approval for AKSU's law program was conveyed in a letter dated November 10, 2025. This predates Governor Eno's November 19 meeting with his aides by nine days. The university stated that the NUC approval followed a resource verification exercise, authorizing AKSU to commence its full-time LL.B. program for the 2025/2026 academic session. The NUC, Nigeria's federal agency for university program approvals, confirmed that approvals are granted when institutions meet prescribed academic and institutional standards.

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I say this to say that we cannot continue to sit down in an opposition political party because there are too many things we cannot do for ourselves. Too many things.