Runs (Nigeria)

Runs 🇳🇬
Location: Nigeria
Definition: Cheating and malpractice by students and staff in higher education
Keywords: Euphemism – Payment – Exchange – Cash – Education – Youth – Sexuality – Gender – Concealment
Clusters: Gaming the system – Co-optation – Camouflage – Creating facades

By Olumuyiwa K. Ojo and Olusola Ayandele, Department of General Studies, The Polytechnic, Ibadan, Nigeria

The term runs in Nigerian English and Pidgin English refers to diverse acts of cheating in the Nigerian educational system. The euphemism derived from the English verb for moving fast by using one's feet is used to downplay the gravity of the offence or to cover up the act of gaining an advantage by illegitimate means. Runs (used in the plural form) is used for a plethora of borderline illegal or immoral activities among students of higher institutions (Ojo, Ayandele and Egbeleye 2020). It describes various subversions of established rules and regulations during the students’ stay on the campus, from admission to graduation. The practices are common and take place in collusion with faculty, non-academic staff, business centre operators, and others. A number of typologies of runs in higher institutions can be found in academic literature (see Ekundayo 2013, Ojebode, Togunde and Adelakun 2010, Ojo et al. 2020). The four basic forms of runs exchanges include (1) sex for higher marks (called ‘sex for grade’), (2) money for higher marks (called ‘money for grade’), (3) examination malpractice, and (4) the use of fake documents.

According to most Nigerian traditional ethos on morals and values known as omoluabi (Yoruba), a person should strive to promote integrity, service, hard work, humility and concern for others. According to some, these principles have been eroded in contemporary Nigeria (Adegoju 2007). Several indigenous languages spoken by Nigerians euphemize illicit exchanges and petty bribery to cover up corrupt practices (Auwal 1987:293, Ndokwu 2004, Yagboyaju 2018): egunje in Yoruba, Chuachua or Toshiyar baki in Hausa, and Igbuozu in Igbo. These cleverly crafted words have helped petty corruption thrive among Nigerians, but the public remains critical of elite corruption. Acknowledging this gap, Goodluck Jonathan, the former president of Nigeria, said in a televised statement that ‘stealing is not the same thing as corruption’ (Aribisala 2014). Nigerian youth, socialised in the context of systemic corruption, does not consider it morally wrong to engage in runs and refuses to accept normative views (Okoli 1997).

Research has established the use of language from other spheres of life to refer to specific runs: words and phrases from business, religion, technology, gambling, transportation, and sports, as well as slang from popular culture. The terms in use that refer to the first type of runs are, for example, a runs girl, denoting someone who is willing to trade sex or money for a higher mark (Okorie and Bamidele 2016[10]), and a runs guy, referring to someone doing illicit transactions or brokering between sides. The runs of ‘sex for grade’ are referred to as ‘trade by barter’ (business), ‘praise and worship’ (religion), ‘swap’ (technology), and ‘farase’ or ‘using body to get it’ (local slang).

The pervasiveness of inappropriate sexual transactions between students and staff in higher education has been reported in the news in Nigeria and beyond (Alagbe 2016). A BBC Africa Eye undercover documentary on ‘sex for grades’ captured four lecturers blackmailing female students and soliciting sex in exchange for marks required for admission to universities in Nigeria and Ghana (Mordi 2019). A Nigerian professor was sentenced to two years in prison for forcing a female student into having sex with him by threatening to award a fail in his course otherwise (Adebayo and Busari 2018). Reports exist of runs girls engaging in strategic sexual relationships with school officials to enhance their academic performance (Ojebode et al. 2010), as well as male students paying for the services of female prostitutes to have sex with school officials in exchange for higher marks (Alagbe 2016).

The second category of runs involves bribing academic and non-academic staff with cash to pass exams or improve marks. The euphemisms in use for this type include ‘sorting, following-up, or subscribing’ (from business); ‘making a shortcut or an upgrade’ (from transportation or technology); ‘betting on the lucky number four’ (aja 4 gbera, from virtual dog race gambling), considered to be the luckiest number; and ‘peace offering’ (from religious contexts). An interested student, called subscriber, finds a runs guy to act as an intermediary. Money is paid as a peace offering to sort out academic matters or to establish a shortcut for a member of staff in charge of processing examination results to upgrade the student’s mark. Reports have been made about the role of poverty in forcing students to engage in robbery or prostitution to make enough money to pay for an improvement of their marks (Oko and Adie 2016).

The euphemistic language devised by students succeeds in shifting attention away from the negative connotations of fraud and cheating during examinations to the more linguistically neutral or positive associations with problem-solving. The runs for practices perpetrated by students to deceive invigilators, escape scrutiny or avoid detection during examinations include such terms as tattoo (fashion), formation (sport), microchips (technology) and panpa (package). Solutions to examination questions inscribed on laps, arms, and palms like body art are known as tattoos, while unauthorized materials smuggled into examination halls by students are known as microchips or panpa (see image). These materials are similarly euphemized as crib sheets or ponies in English, spickzettel in German, and shpargalka or shpora in Russian (Denisova-Schmidt 2017). Formation denotes a strategic seating plan or arrangement that would allow weak students to copy from brilliant ones with or without the invigilator’s connivance.

The fourth category of runs refers to the use of fake certificates, clearance slips, fees receipts and other documents forged by students to gain admission to institutions of their choice or sustain their studentship there. Popular terms in this category include scam, a direct word for fraudulent acts; an FK, a phonemic abbreviation of the word fake; ike, a Yoruba lingo for plastic, which has a connotation of an inferior material; and ro’dan, a local word meaning enacting a deceptive magic. Prospective students often engage a broker, a runs guy, who owns a business centre as a cover for forging documents, admission fraud and certificate racketeering. By introduction, they may also liaise with the higher education staff. Students who commenced their adult lives by cheating with ike or FK or getting involved in ro’dan and scam, might express regret about building their careers on a false foundation which led to unfulfilled dreams (see https://www.dissernet.org). In the short-term, students who got caught can be dismissed from their schools or have their certificates revoked (Kigotho 2004).

References:

Adebayo, B. and Busari, S. 2018. Lecturer demanded sex in return for better grades, Nigerian student says. CNN International+, 23 May. http://edition.cnn.com/2018/05/23/africa/sex-for-grades-university-nigeria-intl

Adegoju, A. 2007. Corruption of language and Nigeria’s debased value system. Nebula 4(3): 339-356.

Alagbe, J. 2016. School where prostitutes assist male students to get marks. Punch Newspaper, 9 April. www.punchng.com/school-where-prostitutes-assist-male-students-to-get-marks/

Aribisala, F. 2014. Nigerian politicians are thieves, but they are not corrupt. Vanguard Newspaper, 22 July. www.vanguardngr.com/2014/07/nigerian-politicians-thieves-corrupt/

Auwal, N. 1987. A Hausa Vocabulary on Corruption and Political Oppression. Corruption and Reform 2(3): 293-296.

Denisova-Schmidt, E. 2017. The challenges of academic integrity in higher education: Current trends and outlook. In CIHE Perspectives (Vol. 5). Boston: Boston College

Ekundayo, S. B. 2013. Lexico-semantic intraference in educated Nigerian English (ENE). International Journal of English Linguistics 3(6): 17-30. http://dx.doi.org/10.5539/ijel.v3n6p17

Kigotho, W. 2004. Nigerian University revokes thousands of diplomas in crackdown on academic fraud. The Chronicle of Higher Education. 1 November. www.utexas.edu/conferences/africa/ads/19.html

Mordi, K. 2019. Sex for Grade: undercover inside Nigerian and Ghanaian universities. BBC African Eye Documentary, 7 October. www.bbc.com/news/av/world-africa-49907376/sex-for-grades-undercovers-in-west-african-universities

Ndokwu, J. N. 2004. Corruption, corrupt practices and Honest leadership in Nigeria. Newscorrupt, 26 May. www.corruption.newscorrupt.org/printer

Ojebode, A., Togunde, D. and Adelakun, A. 2010. Beyond money and gifts: Social capital as motivation for crossgenerational dating among tertiary school female students in south west Nigeria. The International Journal of Interdisciplinary Social Sciences 4:169-182. https://doi.org/10.18848/1833-1882/CGP/v05i04/51673

Ojo, O. K., Ayandele, O. and Egbeleye, S. A. 2020. Euphemisms of Corruption among Students of Higher Institutions in South West Nigeria. Journal of Language and Education 6(1): 72-82. https://doi.org/10.17323/jle.2020.10436

Oko, S. U. and Adie, R . I. 2016. Examination malpractice: Causes, effects and possible ways of curbing the menace. A study of Cross River University of Technology. International Journal of Managerial Studies and Research 4(1): 59-65. http://dx.doi.org/10.20431/2349-0349.0401006

Okoli, C.E. 1997. Examination malpractice, the bone of our society, in A. Ejiogu and K. Alani (eds.), Emergent Issues in Nigeria Education, 343-348. Lagos, Nigeria: Unilag Consult Publication.: 343-348

Okorie, M. M., and Bamidele, O. 2016. Language and class resistance in Nigeria: A foucauldian perspective. Africology: The Journal of Pan African Studies 9(6): 4-15.

Yagboyaju, D. A. 2018. Egunje (Nigeria), in A. Ledeneva (ed.), The Global Encyclopaedia of Informality: Understanding Social and Cultural Complexity, Volume 2, 147-151. London: UCL Press: 147-151. https://doi.org/10.14324/111.9781787351899