APHRC: Nigerian Varsity Journals Predatory, Substandard, Can’t be Indexed

•Urges FG to build national policy framework to curb norm

Kuni Tyessi in Abuja

The Programme Director at African Population and Health Research Centre, APHRC, Dr. Alphonsus Neba, has reiterated that journals from Nigerian universities are mostly predatory, substandard and fall below the capacity of being indexed which remains the hallmark of academic additions.

Speaking yesterday in Abuja during the workshop to empower editors from Nigerian and West African journals towards promoting visibility and discoverability, as well as build capacity for grants writing for Nigerian writers, Neba stated that Nigerian government can step in and assist in building a national journal policy with framework within which journals can be approved to meet minimum standards.

He said by so doing, opportunities can be given to predatory journals that cannot meet up with the standard to naturally phase out or be shut down, while those that can up their game and improve their quality by the standards that have been set by the government will be able to move into that realm where they are seen as quality journals.

He remarked that, that way, academics and professors will not have to worry as there are laid down procedures and ground rules.

He noted with dismay that there are a lot of professors and scientists on the continent who are always under pressure to publish, based on the mantra that you either publish or you perish.

He observed that it is after publication that they get to find out that they have actually published in predatory journals when it comes to the issue of evaluation.

He said: “Most academic journals are perceived to be of low quality and many describe them as predatory journals and therefore our intervention to work with Nigerian and other west African editors to see how we can improve editorial practices and processes in order to improve the quality of journals to the extent that they could now be indexed by global indexing services and with this, they can be accessed without the issue of quality.

“’You can easily pick up journals that can simply pass for predatory journals. There are certain signs. For instance, there are certain journals that publish everything.

“In that journal, you can have published articles on space, to science, medicine, sociology and it’s just without focus. With this, you can easily know that such is a predatory journal.

“Or if you have a journal where the editorial board are from one institution or country, then you can begin to suspect. Or if you have a journal that is constantly chasing authors, reaching out to universities and literally begging for authors to publish in their journal, then you can begin to suspect that such is a predatory journal.

“Sometimes, even the amount of fees they’ll ask will give an inkling that something is wrong and you can easily conclude that this is a predatory journal.

“A lot of professors and scientists on the continent are always under a lot of pressure to publish. You must have heard about the mantra in higher education that states that you either publish or you perish. So, at the end of the day, if you don’t publish, you cannot have an academic career or promotion.

“So that puts a lot of pressure on academics to publish and because of the pressure, they are more than happy to just publish. It is after publication that they get to find out that they have actually published in predatory journals when it comes to the issue of evaluation.”