The Federal Government has set March, 2024 as a final and new dateline for opening of the Nigeria Education Loan Fund, NELFund, popularly called students loan portal for eligible students to check in. Executive Secretary of the NELFund, Dr Akintunde Sawyerr, disclosed this during an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria this morning in Abuja urging eligible students to register on the link provided to access the fund.
President Bola Tinubu had in June 12, 2023, shortly after he took over office signed the Access to Higher Education Bill into law to enable less privilege indigent student’s access interest-free loans to pursue their education career in any Nigerian tertiary institution.
Formerly, the processes was slated to take-off between September and October last year 2023, however, there were some hitches due to unforeseen circumstances that stalled the process, there was a revised timeline to January, and now march.
Sawyerr explained that though the process was marred by some bureaucratic bottleneck but has so far been cleared as it is now technically driven and all necessary measures needed to put in place for proper execution has been perfected.
In his statement, the Executive Secretary said, “The take-off date is this month (March) and the reason for the delay is that we are trying to get it right.
“This is not a political programme where we say, oh! We are just going to do it, it doesn’t matter how it works.
“This is a programme that will, probably run beyond me as a human being, not even as a Secretary. This is something that we want to run adequately, so we have to get it right,’’ he said.
He expressed the determination of the Tinubu administration to ensure that all Nigerian students go to school and pursue careers of their choice.
Sawyer reiterated that the scheme was designed purposely to carter for those indingent who wish to further their tertiary education in Nigeria and they should visit the link to register.
He explained, “We have decided that all applicants should be able to access this scheme regardless of where they are, who they are and who they know.
“We want this to be a process that is fair to all and we will advertise the portal widely so that applicants will be able to go to the website to fill series of forms and answer certain questions.
“Base on the data they input and their answers to the questions, the system will be able to determine appropriately, whether they are eligible to apply or not,’’ Sawyerr added.