FG announces date to begin disbursement of Students loan

By Kazeem Ugbodaga

The Federal Government on Wednesday announced date to begin disbursement of students loan to deserving students seeking tertiary education.

This was revealed by the Permanent Secretary, Federal Ministry of Education, David Adejo, while speaking with newsmen in Abuja.

Adejo revealed that President Bola Tinubu has ordered that the disbursement of the loan should begin from September for the 2023/2024 academic session.

According to him, the president had approved the committee made up of the ministries and agencies and that their meeting would be coming up on June 20.

In his words: “The president has also directed that by September to October of this 2023/2024 academic session, he wants to see recipients of these loans. So, it is a very serious march for us. So between now and then, we have to phantom the process for people to get the loan.”

He said learning from past mistakes, the bank disbursing the loans was not going to be the type that would sit down and be collecting application loans.

Adejo stated that the bank would also perform normal banking functions and make sure loans were given because there had been cases of loan recovery in the past.

Tinubu had on Monday kept one of his campaign promises by signing into law a bill making available to Nigerian students interest free loans to pay their tuition fees.

According to a statement by the Presidency, the Students Loan Bill was sponsored by former Speaker Femi Gbajabiamila. It was passed by the National Assembly.

The legislation has as its short title, the ‘Students Loan (Access to Higher Education) Bill, 2019,’ While its long title is ‘A Bill for an Act to provide for easy access to higher education for Nigerians through interest-free loans from the Nigerian Education Fund established in this Act with a view to providing education for all Nigerians and for other purposes connected thereto.’

The Bill seeks the establishment of the Nigerian Education Fund, domiciled with the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) from which qualified applicants can access education loans through the commercial banks in the country.