The National Association of Nigerian Students, on Tuesday visited President Bola Tinubu over the students’ loan bill signed into law on Monday.
NANS asked the president to remove the Nigerian Bar Association, NBA and the Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU from the board of the Nigerian Education Loan Fund.
The NANS President said: “We thank the President for the Students Loan Bill.
“We have outlined the clauses that we are not too comfortable with. And part of them is the issue of that board that we mentioned to the President, which we said at least students’ representatives should be captured and there are some organisations that they put there, which to us, they don’t need to be there.
“We gave him an example, most especially the Nigerian Bar Association, ASUU. ASUU has its own microfinance bank running their own affairs without students on their board. So, I don’t think it’s wise for us to allow them to be inside our own board because it is purely students.
“We are the major stakeholders of that bank. So I don’t think allowing them to be there is good. Not only them, we mentioned a lot of people that they should remove and put more of student-oriented organisation.”
In response, the President promised to consider the requests of the NANS leaders.
Tinubu said: “You have to promote unity and stability among each other. You have to employ democratic means in your programmes and elections. I have to say anyone who is unable to accept and celebrate a free and fair election, does not deserve the joy of victory.
He added, “Poverty should not prevent anybody, any child, including the daughter or son of a wood seller, ‘boli’ (plantain) seller or yam seller from attaining their highest standard of education, to eliminate poverty,” Tinubu said when he received the leadership of the National Association of Nigerian Students at the State House, Abuja.
“If we all believe that education is the greatest weapon against poverty, then we have to invest in it. If you eliminate poverty from one family, you can carry the rest of the weight.”
