The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) has requested that President Bola Tinubu amend the recently approved Students Loans Act to include grants for needy students.
ASUU National President, Prof. Emmanuel Osodeke, stated today on Channels Television’s Sunday Politics program that “this would have been better if we are giving it to those set of students who are very poor; it should be called a grant, not a loan.”.
“Since it comes from the Federation Account, it should be referred to as a grant rather than a loan because once these individuals have access to it, they have heavy debts to pay off by the time they graduate and, if they don’t, they will be sent to jail in two years if they don’t.
We are discussing collective bargaining because it allows for the inclusion of all viewpoints. ”.
In order to keep a promise he made during his campaign, Tinubu signed the Students Loans Bill into law on Monday.
Femi Gbajabiamila, who is currently the President’s Chief of Staff, was the Speaker of the 9th House of Representatives and the bill’s sponsor.
The law, which is now an Act, offers free loans to underprivileged Nigerian students. The loan is not feasible, according to the president of ASUU.
He declared that the loan “is not sustainable.”.
The concept of a student loan originated in a bank that had been established, according to Osodeke. You can look into people who borrowed money but never paid it back. A Students’ Loan Board was established by military decree 50, which was implemented in 1994 and 1993.
It was domesticated in 2004 by the National Assembly, and it took off the following year. The money vanished. We’re interested in how this one will be different. ”.
He claims that there are over a million students enrolled in Nigeria’s public universities, making it impossible for the loan to fully cover tuition costs.
The loan’s terms, according to the ASUU President, are “not realistic,” and more than 90% of students won’t be able to fulfill the “stringent requirements” necessary to apply for and repay the loan.
“We, as a union, also conducted research of nations around the world to determine the suicide rates of people who had benefited from this loan. Recently, (President Joe) Biden has been attempting to repay some Americans who borrowed money from US banks, the speaker said.
Instead of burdening students with loans who have parents who make N30,000 a month, it is preferable to look for alternative sources of education funding. ”.
