Education minister Adamu Adamu has slammed Muslim elites in northern Nigeria for using Islam to “keep women at home,” describing their action as senseless.

“The first two universities in the world were established by Muslim women, and here people are using Islam to keep women at home. I think it does not make sense,” the minister noted.

Mr Adamu also blamed northerners for their “self-imposed” educational backwardness.

The minister stated this at Tuesday’s public presentation of Core Curriculum Minimum Academic Standards (CCMAS) Book 1 series for Nigerian universities and a book in his honour in Abuja.

“The North is in self-imposed educational backwardness because the interest of the North is Islam, and Islam is the greatest promulgator of knowledge. In 859 AD, one Fatima Al-Fihri (sic), a Muslim woman, established the first university in the world,” explained Mr Adamu. “At the time, the Italian universities, Oxford, Cambridge universities had not started. The first university is still existing there. It is now in Morocco.”

The education minister added, “And about 100 years after that one, another university was established, the second university in the world before the universities of Europe, in Cairo and just like the first one, this university was established by a Muslim woman, Fatimatu Zahara.”

Mr Adamu, however, expressed delight that many of the 37 new private universities approved by the Federal Executive Council on Monday are situated in the North.

He called for establishing a federal teachers’ service commission, saying such a move would ensure reforms in the profession yield desired results.

“I want to leave one legacy in your hands (heads of education agencies and others), we wrote a letter, and the president approved everything,” the minister said. “But there is one yet to come to fruition that will make education totally different.”

Mr Adamu admitted that it was recently “I realised that we need a Federal Teachers Service Commission.”

(NAN)