The Federal Government has pledged to pay a total of N8 billion in outstanding obligations to Nigerian students on the now-scrapped Bilateral Education Agreement scholarship, saying the scheme was riddled with fraud and abused beyond its original purpose.
Minister of Education, Tunji Alausa, made this known on Tuesday during an interview on Channels Television, stating that N4 billion had already been disbursed and the remaining N4 billion would be approved within two weeks.
“We’ve paid four billion of it. We’re disbursing the four billion now. This additional four billion will be approved. I’ve been in constant communication with the Minister of Finance. It will be approved in the next two weeks. They will be settled,” he said.
Alausa said one of the first files placed before him upon assumption of office exposed the scale of the scheme’s abuse. He disclosed that he was asked to approve N650 million to send 60 students to Morocco, and among the courses listed was a scholarship for a Nigerian student to study English in a French-speaking country.
“650 million for 60 students? And as I was looking at the courses that were going to go to Morocco, we have a Nigerian scholarship given to a student that will go study English in Morocco, a French-speaking country. Had so many of those courses, psychology, sociology, zoology, botany,” he said.
The minister said the BEA was originally designed as a diplomatic instrument to send Nigerian students abroad for specialised training in fields such as engineering, medicine, and aeronautics, but had been distorted over the years into a general overseas education subsidy.
He further disclosed that some beneficiaries were found to be simultaneously enrolled in Nigerian universities while collecting BEA funds, a development he described as indefensible.
“We also had incidences of kids that got this scholarship that they’re studying in Nigerian universities, getting the money. So, we stopped it,” he said.
The Federal Government formally scrapped the scheme in April 2025, affecting over 1,200 students abroad. The government clarified that the suspension was maintained into 2026, even as a fresh N1.7 billion allocation for the programme appeared in the 2026 Appropriation Bill, stating that the budgetary provision was a procedural rollover and not a policy reversal.
