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The Nigeria Education Loan Fund (NELFund) has denied allegations of diverting funds allocated for the national student loan scheme, stating that N54 billion has been “transparently” disbursed from the N203 billion it has received to date.
Akintunde Sawyerr, managing director of NELFund, said this Wednesday when he appeared before the House of Representatives Committee on Student Loans.
He explained that the recent statement by the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) had wrongly implicated NELFund in allegations of fund diversion. According to him, the ICPC’s comments were based on a prior media report suggesting that some 51 institutions were not complying with the regulations guiding access to student loans.
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Sawyerr stated that the fund responded swiftly to the claims, prompting the ICPC to retract its specific allegation of diversion against NELFund.
“I don’t think that has happened ever in Nigeria, where a security agency within hours reverses itself on a statement that was made”, he said, but regretted that despite the retraction, significant reputational damage had already occurred, especially in a scheme that initially faced public scepticism.
Providing details of the fund’s operations, Sawyerr disclosed that NELFund had disbursed approximately N54 billion to date, N30 billion to 303 government-owned tertiary institutions and N24 billion as stipends to 293,000 Nigerian students.
According to him, the disbursement followed the legal requirement that 90% of the received funds must be used strictly for student loans.
Giving a further breakdown, he said NELFund had received a total of N203 billion, broken down into N10 billion from the Office of the Accountant General, N143 billion from TETFund, and N50 billion in recovered proceeds from the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, all on presidential directives.
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“So far, NELFund has received 203 billion Naira in the bank account that we hold at the Central Bank of Nigeria. I have to say that we take with the utmost seriousness any issues of funds being diverted within and outside or related to in any way NELFund because we recognise that this project is a sacred project and it should not be tampered with. We recognise that we can stunt the growth of not just Nigeria but of individuals within Nigeria if we don’t behave and act responsibly,” he said.
In his address earlier, Ifeoluwa Ehindero, Chairman of the Committee, stated that, the committee has been inundated with several reports, making waves on the social media, including concerns about possible diversion of loan funds and issues that have to do with the disbursement and administration of the student loan by certain federal institutions.
This, he said, necessitated the meeting with the agency to provide clarifications and enlighten the committee on the issues that have been making the rounds on social media.
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