The Nigerian Education Loan Fund (NELFUND) said it has so far disbursed N116.184bn as at Jan 1st, 2025 for upkeep of students across 176, 252 beneficiary institutions in the country.

The managing director, Akintunde Sawyer, said this on Thursday in Abuja when he appeared before the National Assembly joint committee on tertiary institutions and TETFUND to defend the budget of the agency.

He said out of the N116.184bn, N37.7bn was expended on institution loans.

He said a total number of 352, 796 students applied for the loan while 108,484 had successfully received the loan.

On the 2025 budgetary proposal, the NELFUND boss said a budgetary envelope of N58.4bn was proposed for the agency.

“Out of the N58.4 billion budgetary proposal for 2025, N12.2billion is earmarked for personnel cost, N24.7 billion for overhead cost and N21.4 million for capital expenditure”, he explained.

After consideration of budgetary proposals of the agency, the joint committee accordingly approved it through voice vote put to members.

Earlier before approval of the NELFUND’s budgetary proposal, chairman of the joint committee, Sen. Dandutse Muntari, emphasised the need to ensure transparency on spending of appropriations approved for the organisation in 2025.

“We will examine NELFUND’s financial plan for the upcoming fiscal year to evaluate its alignment with national educational goals and its capacity to meet the growing demands for student loans.

“The agency plays an indispensable role in bridging financial gaps for students across our tertiary institutions,” Mr Muntari said.

(NAN)