Lagos, Nigeria – In a surprising development, the Lagos State University (LASU) has addressed the controversy surrounding a university certificate that was recently discovered at a local ‘suya’ (grilled meat) spot.
According to a statement released by the university on Tuesday, the certificate in question does belong to one of their graduates, but it has been invalidated since 2013 due to an error in the spelling of the recipient’s surname.
The statement explains that the certificate was initially issued to Abisoye Azeez Oluwaseun, who graduated with a Second Class Honours (Upper Division) in Chemical and Polymer Engineering. However, the surname was incorrectly printed as “ABISOYE” instead of the proper spelling, “ABIOYE.”
LASU confirmed that the university recovered the invalidated certificate on November 21, 2018 and issued a corrected version to the graduate on September 30, 2014. However, the university acknowledged that the obsolete certificate should have been properly disposed of but instead found its way into the public domain.
“The invalidated certificate got into the public space due to improper screening of office waste papers prior to disposal,” the LASU statement read.
The university has emphasized that the certificate circulating online is no longer valid and has reiterated its commitment to maintaining the integrity of academic credentials issued by the institution.