This paper was designed to understudy the contemporary issues affecting quality provisions in the Nigerian university context. It has been observed that qualities are declining gradually in the provision of university education in the country. However, studies that have looked into the problems the universities are faced with are yet to close the gap in knowledge of other factors that remain problematic within the sector especially problems created by the private universities. This study uses a standard literature review to study quality and the problems the universities are faced with. The paper uses a qualitative approach to gather the opinion of academic staff from public universities to explain why they think the private universities are causing the decline in the sector. The finding reveals that there is need for private universities to adhere to the principle of reciprocity (that is mutuality) of capacity and accountability. This is because in a system governed by the principle of reciprocity of capacity and accountability, everyone re-writes his job description in terms of the value they add to enhance the instructional programme. It is all about what you can do best and how best you can put other functions of the system to work.
