Investigate Alleged Fraud in Students Loan Disbursement – CONUA 

By Chinedu Echianu

The Congress of Nigerian University Academics (CONUA) has called for an immediate investigation into alleged diversion of student loans by some Universities in collusion with certain Banks.

CONUA is a Union of lecturers in tertiary institutions in thirty universities and inter University Centres across Nigeria, which broke away from the Academic Staff Union of Universities ASUU in 2022.

Recall that the National Orientation Agency (NOA), through its community workers, had raised an alarm on the alleged diversion but failed to name the banks and Universities involved.

Director General of NOA, Lanre Issa-Onilu, had made public NOA’s findings after meeting with Akintunde Sawyer, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of the Nigerian Education Loan Fund (NELFUND), a body that is responsible for disbursing loans to students.

In the meeting with the NELFUND boss, the NOA DG had alleged that certain schools, working together with some banks, were purposely delaying payments to students who qualified for loans in order to make money from the chaos.

However in a chat with Labour correspondents in Abuja, National President of the Congress of Nigerian University Academics (CONUA) Niyi Sunmonu wondered why the NOA failed to name the Universities and Banks involved in the alleged diversion of student loans and called for immediate investigation and prosecution of those involved.

“We blame the NOA for not naming and shaming those who are allegedly involved. So let them set up fact finding committees and expose those involved and let them face the music. We also want the whole process to be transparent to the students who are the beneficiaries of the loans. The moment you approve of loans for Mr. A in so and so University, let it be known to them that the loan has been disbursed.”

Sunmonu also called on the Federal government to include unions such as CONUA in the monitoring process for the student loans to ensure that there is no discrepancy in the disbursement.