By Kesandu Egburonu
The President of Nigeria, Bola Ahmed Tinubu, in light of his new motto, “hitting the ground running,” has launched a new policy called ‘Student Loan Bill.’ This bill aims to cater for students who wish to start or continue their tertiary education but do not have the funds to do so.
According to President Tinubu, this is a win for the educational sector and a benefit students will now enjoy, which they previously didn’t.
As expected, the new bill has received mixed reactions from well-meaning Nigerians. A lot of Nigerians have since praised the bill and lauded the President for taking the initiative while a large number have knocked the President as they expressed their fears concerning the bill.
In all, there appears to be positives as well as negatives in this new bill and it is worth noting that, since this bill is going to affect Nigerians, it is only normal for people to raise their concerns as well without being labelled as “naysayers” or “enemies of progress.”
Before talking about the good and bad of this new bill, let’s acquaint ourselves with it. For starters, like earlier stated, the bill seeks to provide loan facilities for students of tertiary institutions. Not only will they be able to access loans that will aid their academic pursuit, there will be no interest rate on these loans provided. Knowing well how interest rates cripple borrowers, this exemption makes the bill quite attractive.
Another selling point of the new student loan bill is the fact that repayment only comes into effect 2 full years after the completion of the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC). This is mapped out this way just so that borrowers would have ample time to repay. In all honesty, any loan that gives 2 years to repay after your education is complete seems a fair trade to me. Another thumbs up to this new bill.
The fact that the bill does not segregate which tertiary institution cost it covers is another attractive outlook. Whether you choose to collect the loan in order to attend Covenant University (private University) or University of Nigeria, Nsukka (public University), you will be eligible, nonetheless, with no discrimination whatsoever of your choice.
There are, however, terms and conditions that apply before such loans are issued out to anyone. For starters, persons with drug related offences cannot be eligible to receive this loan. Persons guilty of defaulting previous loans cannot qualify too.
The conditions get even more worrying when you look at all the other conditions for obtaining the loan: You must provide two guarantors who are either: a lawyer with 10yrs experience on the job; a Civil servant on minimum of level 12 or; a Judicial officer.
On a personal level, your parent(s) must earn a minimum of #500,000 per year and must not have defaulted on any student loan or any other loan at that. Those who have been guilty of exam practice are ruled out of this as well. In short, it seems you must be near sparkling clean to benefit from this loan.
Of all the terms and conditions guiding the issuance of this loan, what really bothers me the most is the fact that inability to pay back this loan could lead to a jail sentence, a fine or even both! That is just astonishing and that leads to some of my criticisms of this bill. In all its glory, the components of the bill raise so many question marks and when levelled up against present day realities, I believe many will understand my stance on this.
To begin with, I must stress that it is one thing to collect a loan and another thing entirely to pay back that loan. I have seen a multitude of people beg for waivers after collecting and failing to pay back loans or pay back only part. Even in advanced countries like the U.S.A, the same applies and it is well documented. Now, since this can happen in such advanced nations, what is to say that loan defaulting will not occur here? Does it then mean that down the years we will start seeing millions of Nigerians being sent to jail over loans? That will be another big storm I don’t even want to imagine, with the outcry maybe even worse than the #EndSARS debacle.
Let us, also, cast a glance at Nigeria’s unemployment rate which stands at about 33.3%. Experts say it could even dwindle and there’s nothing to suggest it wouldn’t, just as predicted. It is not a secret that so many job leavers struggle to lock down a job upon graduation. In fact, former President, Goodluck Jonathan, once urged citizens to go learn a trade or skill they could fall back on. That epitomises it all.
In the event you get a job, what are the odds that the job actually pays well? I do not need any citation for this. I have witnessed how paltry salaries can be while on my journey in the media profession. I have seen graduates earn as low as #45, 000 per month or even less. We have seen 1st class graduates turn to petty traders and tricycle riders. It is the present state of Nigerian life and our harsh reality.
Now, if after completion of NYSC, 5yrs down the line and you are yet to acquire a job; what happens to you? You get locked up in Kirikiri Maximum Prison? What happens if the second reality hits you and you are only able to lock down a #45, 000 monthly salary job? With the current price of fuel in Nigeria ranging from N500-1000, take that out of your salary, transport, feeding and other expenses, how much is left? That’s if you don’t even carry over debts into the next month? What happens when either of these hits you after collecting Tinubu’s student loan? You become an inmate? Permit me if I choose to laugh at this point. It’s just hilarious to imagine.
In the first place, what is to even say you get a guarantor of such status willing to stake their necks for you to begin with? If you factor in the conditions of getting the loan and the aftermath of post-graduate realities in Nigeria, then, it appears the risks far outweigh the benefits of this loan. Without mincing words, if I was just about gaining admission into a tertiary institution in Nigeria, factoring all of these, I will run from that loan as far away as I can.
The loan, as heralded as it appears, gets my thumbs down.
