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NELFUND disburses N11bn to 90,000 students in six months
The Managing Director of the Nigerian Education Loan Fund (NELFUND), Dr Akintunde Sawyerr, on Tuesday, said the agency has disbursed N11billion as loans to 90,000 students in six months.
Sawyerr disclosed this during an oversight visit by the Senate Committee on Tertiary Institutions and TETFUND led by its chairman Senator Muntari Dandutse, in Abuja.
He said that fees and stipends for over 90,000 students have been paid.
He said: “Three hundred students have been deemed to qualify for the loans. The gap between those that have qualified and those in benefit of the loan is that we have to go through a rigorous process to ensure we are not giving money to the wrong people.”
Sawyerr said that from the N96 billion earmarked for students’ loans, about N11 billion has been disbursed to the 90, 000 students across the country.
He said: “That figure, N96 billion, is the loan committed to. It’s not the disbursed figure. We have disbursed just below N11 billion.
“The rest of it is going to be disbursed over the next few weeks to students until it gets to that 96 billion.”
He noted that the loan was in two categories; the Institutional Loan and the Upkeep Loan adding that students don’t have to apply for either loan.
“They don’t have to apply for either loan. However, they can only apply for the upkeep loan if they have applied for the institutional loan and received it.
“The institutional loan is the primary loan that allows them to access education.
“Once they have accessed that loan and they get that, they can also get the upkeep but they can’t get the upkeep on its own because upkeep is tied to going to school”.
Sawyerr said that the agency was determined to change the lives of students through the Renewed Hope mandate of President Bola Tinubu-led administration.
He said that in terms of the geo-political zones’ spread of the disbursement, 12 per cent of students from the North-central have benefited from the facility.
“The North-east, 26 per cent have benefited; the North-west, 38 per cent; South-east, about 10 per cent; South-south, about 4 per cent and the South-west, 13 per cent.
“These numbers have doubled since we’ve been there. So, we are monitoring it month by month,” Sawyerr said.
On the loan repayment modalities, Sawyerr said that it has been made very easy in that the programme is not a profit-making activity for the Fund.
“This is a profit-making activity for the nation. Therefore, we have tried to put in soft terms, so that people will not be discouraged from going to school”.
He said that the repayment was for two years after the mandatory National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) if they have a job.
“The onus is on the employer to pay on their behalf or to take money from their salaries”.
Donald J. Trump just won the 2024 election. President Elect Trump will be getting inaugurated on January 20, 2025 as the 47th President of The United States after the Electoral College vote on January 6th 2025.
The former president’s victory was the highlight of a big night for Republicans, who were also projected to regain control of the Senate after four years in the minority.
The fate of the House of Representatives was too close to call early Wednesday, with the majority not likely to be determined for several days.
In an eerie repeat of the scenes on Election Night 2016, thousands of Harris supporters who gathered on the campus of the veep’s alma mater, Howard University, to watch the results come in were left shocked and in tears as it became clear their candidate could not win.
In the end, it was not Harris but her campaign co-chair, Cedric Richmond, who was left to inform the desolate crowd that the Democratic nominee would not be appearing.
“We still have votes to count … so you won’t hear from the vice president tonight,” said Richmond, a former Louisiana congressman and Biden White House official. “She will be back here tomorrow.”
“Go HU and go Harris.”
The 45th president had projected supreme confidence against Harris, 60, in the final days of the race, with heavy messaging aimed at male voters and a marathon schedule of rallies and media appearances — including a shift at a Pennsylvania McDonald’s.
Meanwhile, Harris downplayed both her potential to make history as the first female president and her racial identity as a child of Jamaican and Indian immigrants.
Instead, she campaigned as a pro-small business warrior for the middle class, while seemingly disavowing a host of former left-wing stances she had espoused as San Francisco district attorney, California attorney general and a senator from the Golden State.
Trump’s victory makes him just the second president to be elected in non-consecutive cycles, joining Democrat Grover Cleveland — who was picked as the 22nd president in 1884 and the 24th president in 1892, with Republican Benjamin Harrison of Indiana serving four years in between.
The race was widely considered a toss-up right through Election Day, as surrogates for both candidates made rhetorical blunders that received widespread media attention.
Jamilu Abdullahi, a Bureau de Change, BDC, operator, has revealed how he exchanged naira brought to him by agents of Kogi State Government for the payment of school fees of the daughters of former governor, Yahaya Bello to dollars.
Abdullahi revealed this while speaking as the third prosecution witness in the trial of Ali Bello, on Tuesday, November 5, 2024, before Justice Obiora Egwuatu of the Federal High Court, Maitama, Abuja on 18-count charges of money laundering and misappropriation to the tune of over N3 billion by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC.
In a cross-examination by Ali Bello’s counsel, A.M. Aliyu SAN, Abdullahi affirmed that a dollar equivalent in cash was exchanged for each tranche of naira brought to him: “I made it clear that it was cash that was brought to my office for payment of the school fees,” he said,
An effort by the defence to evaluate a WhatsApp conversation between the witness and the second defendant, Abba Adaudu as evidence, was objected to by prosecution counsel Abbas Mohammed, who argued that the copy of the WhatsApp conversation was unknown to the court.
Consequently, the defence requested an adjournment to enable it to furnish the prosecution with the WhatsApp chat.
Justice Egwuatu granted the request and adjourned the matter till November 6, 2024 for continuation of trial.
Ali Bello, cousin to Yahaya Bello is being prosecution by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, alongside Adaudu, Yakubu Adabenege and Iyada Sadat.
Again, Trump wins 2024 US Presidential election
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