UNILORIN Leads Other Six Varsities To Develop Academic Fraud Detector Software

A Nigerian federal institution, University of Ilorin has joined forces with six other universities to develop home-grown anti-plagiarism software, designed to check academic fraud.

According to the University Bulletin issued on Monday, the other universities are Al-Hikmah University, Ilorin and Covenant University, Ota. Others are Delta State University Abraka, Benue State University Makurdi, University of Jos and Obafemi Awolowo University Ile-Ife.

According to the publication the software programme development was at the instance of the Association of Vice-Chancellors of Nigerian Universities (AVCNU). This, it said, is the umbrella organisation for Vice-Chancellors of the nation’s federal, state and private universities.

It said the AVCNU had mandated its Information and Communication Technology Sub-committee, chair, and the Vice-Chancellor, University of Ilorin, Prof. AbdulGaniyu Ambali, to assemble IT team from Nigerian universities. The publication said this would develop the home-grown anti-plagiarism software with the local repository. It quoted the Director, Computer Services and Information Technology (COMSIT), Directorate of the University of Ilorin, Prof. Mohammed Ahmed, as saying the software was at 80 per cent completion. Ahmed added that using local human resource to develop the software has helped to cut down cost and show the ingenuity of Nigerians. He explained that the software has both local and global repository with features such as peer review, document comparison, and grammar checker.

`’Other features are language support and title validation, with the name EAGLE SCAN being proposed for the programme,’’ he said. Ahmed said when operational, the anti-plagiarism application, would be made available to all Nigerian universities. He said that the application would compete globally, and he called on the AVCNU to see to the digitisation of local contents in the various universities.

“The VC of the Unilorin Prof. AbdulGaniyu Ambali, commended the technical team put together by the AVCNU to develop the programme. He noted that plagiarism is a criminal offence that has given the AVCNU concern, adding that the development of the programme is the AVCNU’s effort to ensure quality control towards quality assurance in the Nigeria education system.