Vice-President, Professor Yemi Osinbajo has condemned the high level of plagiarism in tertiary institutions in Nigeria. He said it is nothing but a form of corruption and stealing of intellectual property of others that must be stopped.
He said this in Abuja at a public presentation and launching of EagleScan, a homegrown Plagiarism Detection Software, developed by the Committee of Vice-Chancellors of Nigerian Universities (CVC).
Osinbajo who was represented by the Executive Secretary of National Universities Commission (NUC), said the plagiarism detection software being launched was in line with the zero-tolerance for all forms of corruption by the current administration of President Muhammadu Buhari Administration.
The main features of the software include Plagiarism Checker, Peer Review, Document Comparison, Grammar Checker, Similarity Index, Grade Mark, Local and foreign Language Support/Converter, Local/Global Repository, Title/Abstract Validation, LMS Integration, Report Download, User Account Management, and Self-Archival Interface.
The Software also comes with a very robust artificial intelligence-driven data analytics and visualization engine. It is currently hosted on www.eaglescan.ng.
According to the Vice-President, the Federal government is fully committed to supporting all initiatives that would continue to build and enhance the integrity of higher institutions in the country.
“Let me also say that the government will give all that is needed to ensure that anti-plagiarism measures are instituted across the country”. Prof. Osinbajo added.
The Chairman of Occasion and the Deputy Chairman, Senate Committee on Higher Education, Prof Sandy Onor, said the Software will address the challenge of Academic research authentification and validation.
“The EagleScan Plagiarism Detection Software integrates global open source and closed source repositories, local Open Education Repositories and it allows users to validate titles abstracts and generate originality report,” he said.
Minister of Education, Adamu Adamu, applauded the indigenous anti-plagiarism software saying it will facilitate the desired quality expected in institutions of higher learning.
He emphasised the need to institutionalise an anti-plagiarism policy in all higher institutions, which according to him, will encompass various aspects of Plagiarism.
“Having the software is one aspect of the battle against plagiarism, universities must take concrete steps to institutionalise anti-plagiarism policy that forbids all aspects of the intellectual theft.”
“For so long the issues of Plagiarism amongst others such as copyrights as well as abuses of infringement have robbed our universities the much-desired integrity,” he said.
The Chairman, Association of Vice-Chancellors, Prof Timothy Olagbemiro, said the EagleScan will make the Nigerian University System more authentic and that it will add value to education both in Nigeria and International.
The Secretary-General of the Committee of Vice-Chancellors, Prof Yakubu Ochefu said the Cost of development, deployment, maintenance, and marketing of the software over the next three years, is projected at a total sum of N251,298,000.00.
“A substantial part of this cost is for licensing closed user databases and repositories. For now, CVC Secretariat is hosting the Secretariat for the Eagle Scan Technical Team.”
