NELFUND: CVCs seek amendment of Act to accommodate more poor students

From Adesuwa Tsan, Abuja

The Committee of Vice Chancellors (CVC) in Nigeria has urged the National Assembly to amend the establishment Act of the Nigeria Education Loan Fund (NELFUND) to remove the provision that makes it compulsory for an applicant to complete registration before applying for funds.

Its, Prof. Sagir Abbas of the Bayero University, Kano, made this appeal when he appeared before the Senate Committee on Tertiary Institutions and TetFund.

Also present at the meeting which was conveyed to defend the 2025 budget proposal of public tertiary institutions and that of the National Universities Commission (NUC) was the latter’s Executive Secretary, Prof. Abdullahi Ribadu.

Prof. Abass, while commending NELFUND,  said it was important to make the adjustment to the law because the targeted beneficiaries of the loan are people who cannot afford to pay for their education and therefore, cannot meet the requirement to do their registration due to lack of funds.

“The fund says until students are registered, then they can apply and they may not be able to register because they cannot afford it.

“They should immediately apply when granted admission. They can use their JAMB number for the application.”

He also urged the Committee to increase the allocation to universities to enable them carry out their core functions of teaching and research. According to him, they spend over N100m on electricity bill alone monthly, minus security, cleaning and other financial obligations.

Abass went further to call for a review of the wages of university workers and seek ways to address security challenges bedeviling the institutions.

In his submission, the ES of NUC sought the review of the Act establishing the commission.

This he said was to enable the NUC perform its duties efficiently.

“We need to review the act to enable the commission to perform its duties efficiently. We’ll see you on this one, because we already have a draft actually.

“The landscape has changed. Meanwhile, the law, the Act of 2004 remains. So for us to be able to perform our functions efficiently, we really need to look at this, at the NUC Act.”

He listed the commission’s and universities’ challenges to include inadequate funding.

“In spite of the consistent financial support from the federal government to public universities over the years, through budgetary allocation and other interventions.

“Inadequate funding appears to be an insurmountable challenge to the delivery of quality education in Nigeria.

“Inadequate infrastructure, thanks to TETFund for its intervention. Poor facilities for teaching and learning and research, inadequate access, still a big problem in spite of the improvement in access over the years by the licensing of additional universities”.

Earlier, the Chairman of the Committee, Senator Muntari Dandutse, urged the NUC to demonstrate a clear and sustainable strategy for integrating internally generated revenue into its overall financial plan.

“With rising demands on public resources, Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) is a crucial mechanism for achieving long-term sustainability and enhancing the competitiveness of our universities.”

At the end of the parley, the committee asked the NUC and CVC to collaborate and put their demands in a document that will be presented to the Senate President, Senator Godswill Akpabio, for onward transmission to President Bola Tinubu.