The Federal Government has expressed the plan to fund the Student Loan Scheme through the Education Tax Fund, under the Federal Inland Revenue Service.

The FIRS Chairman, Zacch Adedeji, made this known at the Presidential Villa, Abuja on Monday while briefing State House Correspondents alongside the Executive Secretary of the Board, Dr Akintunde Sawyerr.

Adedeji explained that the deployment of the Education Tax Fund in the scheme is one of the ways the government can be accountable to taxpayers in the country.

Also speaking, Sawyerr assured that the process for applying for the loan would be devoid of human intervention, adding that every action would be undertaken on an App specifically designed for the purpose.

According to him, the government was keen to ensure that young Nigerians do not fail to acquire tertiary education just because of a lack of funds to continue their studies.

He however assured that the implementation of the student loan scheme would enable Nigerians to pick a career trajectory of their choice rather than being forced to do something else because they were unable to acquire the requisite education due to lack of funds.

Sawyerr further explained that the loan would help prevent the dangerous adventure, whereby Nigerian youths would pass across the Sahel to Europe in search of a better life.

Stating that every Nigerian was eligible to access the loan, he stated that only the most needy would be supported, adding that school fees for successful applicants would be transferred directly to their institutions.

Sawyerr said, “It’s a pleasure to be here today to brief you on the impending launch of the Nigerian Education Loan Fund, which is the bedrock that will operationalize the student loan scheme in Nigeria. It’s a great opportunity to help solve an age-old problem that has been on in this dear nation of ours for quite some time.

“There are many, many people with great capacity and with the desire to improve their education. And usually, the place where that falls is when they get into the tertiary base. At that point they have several options, either to go into the world of work with qualifications that are not necessarily optimal for them or to find ways of funding that tertiary space.

“When I say tertiary, some of it is academic. So university education is generally regarded as academic but this programme seeks to provide opportunities for Nigerian students who want to go into the academic side and get a university degree or perhaps want to go into the technical side and go and acquire some vocational skills and some vocational qualifications which is always needed in society, and also in the teacher training space. Because you know, without teachers, really none of us are going very far. We have to learn from others and we have to have teachers.

“So, this is a great opportunity for that applicant, and they are the ones that are at the centre of all of this. This act, effectively the intention behind it is to ensure that the reason for not being able to go on and further your education at a tertiary level, is not for the lack of finance.

“This law seeks to bridge the gap between the desire to study and the capacity to go further. It seeks to bridge that gap that is created by lack of finance, lack of funding.”

He added, “I want to say to you that this has been done with a lot of thought. So in application and in applying for this loan, there is zero human intervention. In other words, there is an app. The applicant will go on to a portal, they will engage with that app.

“They will have to put in certain pieces of information which made them eligible, that is their JAMB number, and of course the tie-in to their date of birth. Further pieces of information include things like their national identity number, and NIN, which confirm that they are Nigerians.

“This loan scheme is being paid for by Nigerian taxpayers. So it’s for Nigerians and the NIN helps verify and qualify them as such.

“They’re BVN, financial inclusion because this scheme in itself will at some point be able to empower students, so we need to know they have bank accounts. We need to know where their accounts are to be able to access those accounts.

“It will also have their matric number, and admission number so that we can firmly establish which institution they are going to because one of the key elements of this is that once we’ve received applications and those applications are approved, the fees or the tuition requirements in terms of financials will be transferred directly to the institution.

“That in itself has benefits for the institution. Many many students are struggling to pay their fees, their parents are struggling to pay their fees. There’s a very high dropout rate. So it’s one thing to get into a tertiary institution. It’s another thing to stay there for four years or three years. This scheme seeks to help people access and remain until they qualify or graduate.”

However, Adedeji further explained “This is the fulfilment of Mr President’s promise that we will make education accessible to all. And while I have to put my own is because of the source of funding. This is one of the schemes that we will apply Education Tax that we will collect. So, this is a way of being accountable to the taxpayer because the essence of Education Tax is to consolidate and restore education integrity and quality.

“And in fulfilling that part of the Act, so, that is why Education Tax Fund is one of the sources of funding, by God’s grace, that we’ll use actually to execute this laudable programme.”

Credit: Punch Metro