The Academic Staff Union of Universities has turned down the federal government’s student loan scheme, asserting that the student loan initiative established by the Federal Government is merely a strategy to benefit a select few individuals who own private universities in the country. 

Emmanuel Osodeke, the National President of ASUU, expressed this sentiment through his Vice, Christopher Piwuna, during a conversation with journalists in Bauchi on the sidelines of the award ceremony for indigent scholarships to university undergraduates in the Bauchi Zone of the union. The event took place at the ATBU, Yelwa Campus, on Saturday. 

Osodeke emphasized that if the government genuinely intended to help students, the proposed student loan should be transformed into a grant rather than a loan.

“Right from the start, we believe that the Nigerian state is capable of funding education in Nigeria. All these issues that have led to the introduction of the loan, the issues of charges in our universities, are as a result of poor funding. So, this particular effort by the government is supposed to meet that funding gap in the universities.

“The leadership of President Goodluck Jonathan, I think, tried to demonstrate that, when his administration agreed to release N200 billion in 2013 as part of the NEEDS Assessment and till this day, 10 years after the release of that money, we still see what that money is doing in this system.

“Just imagine if the government takes this funding seriously. So, we are against the student loan as a form of funding education, we think the loan will go back into the cofers of private individuals who are in government today who own private universities. If the government is serious, they should make grants to institutions and students,” he stated.

THE Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), Bauchi Zone, has rejected the students’ loan scheme of the federal government, noting that non-refundable grants should be given to Nigerian students instead of loans.

The ASUU Bauchi Zonal Coordinator, Lazarus Maig-oro, had this to say while speaking on the event:

“The question is: who will pay the loan?

What is the fate of those who cannot access it? The psychological trauma the students will be subjected to due to the loan while still on studies will affect their performance negatively.”‘

Lazarus Maigoro added that: “The fact that they will graduate with a loan of N4 million and above without the capacity to pay back will be another psychological torture for students.”

“Furthermore, those who cannot access the loan due to the stringent conditions attached virtually means dropping out of school. Currently, in view of the hike in school fees or charges in public Universities all over the country, many students have not been able to resume,” he added.

He further said that: “ASUU Bauchi Zone is working on getting the statistics of students who may likely drop out of school at the end of the current session with the hope of making government review its decision on the issue of the loan and replace it with grants.”

The ASUU Zonal coordinator stressed that: “I can authoritatively say without mincing words, that as we teach these students in the classrooms, we notice quite a number who are distressed due to the very harsh economic realities of our country.”

According to him, “In the case of Federal Universities, the government seem to have abandoned its constitutional responsibility of funding Universities and left it at the discretion of the various Governing Councils of the Universities to review it at will thereby making some students drop out of school.”

He also said that: “One of the reasons ASUU went on strike in 2022 for eight months was to make government live up to its own responsibilities of funding University education, but unfortunately parents and students did not support the union to fight this menace collectively and now, students and parents have become victims of what ASUU tried to prevent.”

“For this year, 2023, ASUU Bauchi zone is giving 19 indigent students scholarship apart from the 12 already awarded by ASUU National in the six Universities that constitutes Bauchi zone” he added.