Chidimma Uchegbu -Abuja
The federal government has set up a committee to review the application and disbursement processes of the student loan funds scheme with a view to enhancing efficiency in the exercise.
Minister of Education, Dr. Tunji Alausa, told journalists in Abuja, on Wednesday, that the decision for the committee was taken at the end of a meeting with stakeholders involved in the student loan scheme particularly the Vice-Chancellors, management of pNigerian Education Loan Fund (NELFUND) and officials of the Federal Ministry of Education.
He said the committee consist of representatives from the Vice Chancellors, NELFUND, Directors of University, Polytechnics and Colleges of Education departments in the Ministry, and will be chaired by the Executive Secretary of the National Universities Commission (NUC), Prof. Abdullahi Ribadu.
He disclosed that the committee is expected to review the timeline for the disbursement of funds from NELFUND to universities, from when universities get to refund students, and also notify students about the disbursement
The committee is also expected to work on standardising the nomenclature of the various charges that universities place on students.
“As you know, tertiary education is free in the country. We don’t pay tuition, but there are several fees that are paid to the schools.
“The second reference that we have decided is that the committee will come up with timelines on when NELFUND will pay the approved fees to the universities, while the third timeline was the need to decide on timelines when universities would notify students once they have gotten the money from NELFUND on their behalf, as well as timelines on when they would also make refund to students in the events the student pay the school fees before the NELFUND disbursements.
“The fourth reference is on the way the universities will notify the students. The committee is to decide whether to notify the students by email, SMS, or call or a mixture of all the ways of notification.
“Then we also give them latitude to come up with any other thing the committee considers in improving the processes that we currently have.
“The processes we have now, those processes are working, but we’re just working to better the processes we have now.
“The committee has three weeks to submit its report to myself and the Minister of State, and in the next four weeks we’ll finalise new guidelines on how this entire process will work from NELFUND and from the universities.”
