FG Insists Students Loan Will Provide More Access To Tertiary Education

The Federal Government insists the Student Loan Scheme recently approved by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu is designed to provide more access to tertiary education in the country.

The new law elicited divergent reactions from the public, with the Academic Staff Union of Universities, kicking that the policy may lead to introduction of high tuition fees in universities.

The former Speaker of the House of Representatives, Femi Gbajabiamila, who is now the Chief of Staff to the president, the sponsor of the Student Loan Bill, noted that the student loan scheme was one of the best ways to solve the problem of funding education in Nigeria.

Read More: Nigeria’s Student Loan Law And Its Impact On Education

The executive secretary of the Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFund), Sonny Echono, in an interview in Abuja, said the rationale behind the reintroduction of the students’ loan scheme was to ensure that access to tertiary education is expanded.

He said that some commercial banks are currently granting loans to students, including those studying abroad at very high interest rates and short duration for repayment.

He said tertiary education is expensive and there is no way only the government can provide free higher education to every citizen.

He insisted that the provision of quality education is expensive, coupled with the increasing demands for higher wages by the workers in the system.

He added that there are some other details that the government needs to work on, especially on who manages the loan scheme, how much at a time could be drawn and what are the mechanisms in place to ensure that the money is judiciously and prudently utilised.

He further explained that what was being proposed by the Federal Government was of longer duration, so that people can pay without feeling the impact and that the rate would not be too high.

Echono said on the implementation of the loan, the government would be able to complement it with an educational bank.