NELFUND plans review of N20,000 students’ loan

The Nigerian Education Loan Fund said it would constantly review the N20,000 monthly stipends to Nigerian students based on economic realities.

The Director of Corporate Communications of the Fund, Oseyemi Oluwatuyi, made this known during an interview with our correspondent in Abuja on Wednesday.

Apart from institutional fees, applicants for student loans also have the opportunity to apply for upkeep loans.

Recently, the Fund announced that it paid the N20,000 monthly stipend to over 20,000 students.

Speaking with our correspondent in Abuja, Oluwatuyi when asked if the Fund would review the amount paid as upkeep in line with harsh economic realities said, “Certainly, the N20,000 per month is just a starting point, the fund will adjust the stipend from time to time in line with economic realities.”

Speaking further on students who applied for student loans but were sent out of examination halls, she said, “For the students who were sent out of the hall because of school fees, we can’t comment on that for now because we don’t know which semester exams they were writing.

“Some students are in their second semester and still expect the loan they applied for to cover the current session, it can’t work that way. NELFUND will cover 100 per cent of fees for students starting from their next session (if they are already in the second semester). We won’t also pay retrospectively.”

Barely a month after his inauguration, President Bola Tinubu signed the Access to Higher Education Act, which creates a legal framework for granting loans to indigent or low-income Nigerians to facilitate the payment of their fees in Nigerian tertiary institutions.

The law, reenacted earlier this year, created the Nigerian Education Loan Fund.