Lagos offers half tuition scholarship for new LASU migration master’s course

The Lagos State Office of Diaspora Affairs has offered a 50 per cent tuition scholarship to students admitted into a new Master of Diaspora and Migration Studies programme at Lagos State University. The scholarship applies to the 2025/2026 academic session and forms part of a collaboration between the office and LASU to develop expertise in migration, diaspora engagement and related policy areas. The Executive Secretary of the Lagos State Office of Diaspora Affairs, Jermaine Sanwo-Olu, said the initiative would help build the institutional capacity needed to manage Lagos’s relationship with its diaspora and respond to emerging migration trends.

Sanwo-Olu said the proposed programme and the Centre for Diaspora and Migration Studies were developed with LASU during his doctoral studies. He described diaspora engagement and migration as central to Lagos’s development ambitions, citing the potential contribution of knowledge, skills, investment, networks and international connections. He said eligible candidates would be selected through a screening process.

The programme is open to graduates, academics, government officials, diplomats, development and humanitarian professionals, diaspora affairs officers and migration practitioners. Professionals in related areas, including governance, maritime affairs, heritage and the blue economy, may also apply. Candidates must have at least a second-class lower degree, or its equivalent, in a relevant discipline.

Relevant professional experience will be an advantage. Former LASU Vice-Chancellor Ibiyemi Olatunji-Bello said the initiative could connect academic research with policy on diaspora engagement, migration governance and human mobility. She said migration and diaspora relations increasingly affect economic growth, labour markets, investment, knowledge transfer and international relations.

The full-time master’s programme will run for three semesters and require at least 36 credit units. Its curriculum includes diaspora communities and identities, migration governance, refugee and displacement management, labour migration, human trafficking, urban mobility and policy development, drawing on history, sociology, law and economics.