NELFUND moves to stop double payment of school fees

*No students collect money from parents after NELFUND payment, it is the university that forces them to pay in time of FUND delay – Source

By KEMI KASUMU

He said, “We have had a statement University in Lagos, where management had to ask students to pay their school fees to be able to do their course registration because, they said, the NELFUND had not remitted their school fees to the university. The university, however, refunded the money to the students after sometimes upon the FUND’s remittance. Currently, a Federal University in Abeokuta has also given the sane instructions for students to pay their school fees to avoid be able to do their course registration latest end of November. NELFUND should take responsibility and settle that matter between it and the university not to blame the innocent students.”

The Nigerian Education Loan Fund (NELFUND) has introduced a token-based payment system to prevent students from paying school fees twice and address refund complications associated with the student loan scheme.

Managing Director of NELFUND, Akintunde Sawyerr, announced on Wednesday that the fund had commenced a pilot of the tokenised payment system, with nearly 400,000 applications already received under the ongoing process.

Under the new arrangement, students will use an application on their mobile phones to authorise payments from their approved loan funds directly to their institutions. This is expected to prevent situations in which the fund pays institutions without students being aware of the transactions.

Sawyerr said the initiative followed the discovery that delays in notifying students of payments already made by NELFUND had caused some beneficiaries to pay their school fees a second time.

The development resulted in a backlog of refund cases, leaving some financially vulnerable students waiting to recover money borrowed from family members to meet their educational expenses.

He described the situation as an administrative error rather than fraud, while acknowledging the difficulties it had caused affected students.

NELFUND has also placed about 34 tertiary institutions under investigation over allegations that they failed to refund students whose fees were paid twice.

A five-member investigative team, which includes anti-corruption operatives, has reportedly visited one of the institutions under scrutiny.

Sawyerr, however, acknowledged that NELFUND lacked the statutory powers to arrest or prosecute institutions over the allegations. He advised affected students to petition the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC).

Under the new token-based system, loan funds will not be transferred into students’ personal bank accounts. Instead, each token will be linked to a specific institution, and the student will be required to authorise the release of the funds through a mobile application.

Explaining the rationale behind the initiative, Sawyerr said: “We’re not giving the students money, but we’re giving them power.”

In the meantime, a source that said he overhead a report of NELFUND blaming some students for continuing to collect school fees from their parents despite government payment of the student loan argued that, “The NELFUND would not be fair to the students if all it can do is to blame them for its own shortcomings exploited by the university managements.”

He said, “We have had a statement University in Lagos, where management had to ask students to pay their school fees to be able to do their course registration because, they said, the NELFUND had not remitted their school fees to the university. The university, however, refunded the money to the students after sometimes upon the FUND’s remittance.

“Currently, a Federal University in Abeokuta has also given the sane instructions for students to pay their school fees to avoid be able to do their course registration latest end of November. NELFUND should take responsibility and settle that matter between it and the university not to blame the innocent students.”