By Samuel Oyadongha

Yenagoa — Bayelsa State governor, Mr Seriake Dickson, yesterday, lamented the withdrawal of accreditation of courses at the state- owned Niger Delta University, NDU,  Amassoma, by the National Universities Commission, NUC.

Though the university had last month put forward 31 courses for accreditation, the universities regulatory body approved only four for full accreditation and withdrew seven courses including Law.

Twenty other programmes of the institution were placed on interim official recognition by NUC.

Reasons advanced by NUC for the non-accreditation of the courses were inadequate teaching staff, especially Professors, PhD holders and senior lecturers.

Dickson, who spoke, yesterday, on a Radio Bayelsa special interview programme tagged, 60 minutes with the Contriman Governor,” described the denial of accreditation as “a sad development.”

He blamed the management of the institution for the de-accreditation, noting that the university authorities knew that the accreditation panel of  NUC visits every two or four years and ought to have prepared towards the last exercise.

“It is a sad development. It is very sad because certain things were not handled properly by the authorities of the university. The courses had temporary accreditation. Some even had full accreditation, like Law, for example. Then we had an accreditation panel (from the NUC). The panel visits every two or four years. So, it wasn’t a sudden development.

“The university administration knew that at a particular time, the panel would visit. They ought to have known what to do to prepare the various faculties for the accreditation that the NUC was coming to carry out.”