Presidential candidate of the African Democratic Congress, ADC, Atiku Abubakar, has vowed to review the Nigerian Education Loan Fund, NELFUND, policy and provide debt forgiveness for qualifying Nigerian students, dismissing as “dishonest” President Bola Tinubu’s attempt to present the scheme as proof that education has become more affordable under his administration.
Senior Special Assistant on Public Communication to the former vice president, Phrank Shaibu, said in a statement on Tuesday evening that his response was to Tinubu’s overnight post on X, in which the president attacked Atiku’s economic positions without mentioning him by name.
Shaibu said Tinubu’s invocation of NELFUND as a defence against Atiku’s proposal to cut the cost of energy was disingenuous, arguing that the President had first driven up the cost of education before presenting loans as a rescue package.
He questioned the rationale behind celebrating NELFUND as evidence that education had become affordable while school fees had increased in some institutions. Shaibu said presenting loans as a solution after increasing the cost of education did not amount to making education affordable.
He described the arrangement as “witchcraft economics,” arguing that the government had made education more expensive, provided loans to students to cope with the increase and then sought praise for the intervention.
According to Shaibu, Atiku had already conducted a review of the existing student-loan framework and did not believe young Nigerians should begin their working lives under the weight of education debt.
He said Atiku’s approach would reduce the underlying cost of education and, after a review, provide forgiveness for qualifying student debts so that young Nigerians could graduate without repayment burdens.
Shaibu said education should open doors rather than mortgage the future, insisting that a loan, by its nature, could not be mistaken for a scholarship.
He said the true measure of any education policy was whether families could keep their children in school without being forced to borrow, adding that the government should not present the loan itself as evidence that the system was working when the underlying cost of education had become prohibitive for ordinary families.
He further accused the presidency of deploying what he described as scare tactics against Nigerian students and workers by suggesting that Atiku’s proposed energy intervention, targeted at Nigerian crude supplied for domestic refining, would undermine NELFUND, cut salaries or reverse the minimum wage.
Shaibu challenged the presidency to provide details showing how a transparently budgeted subsidy tied to Nigerian crude and domestic refining would affect NELFUND or workers’ salaries.
He maintained that Atiku’s position was the direct opposite of what the presidency had claimed, insisting that reducing the cost of energy and transportation would enable workers to get more value from their salaries and reduce the amount spent on transportation.
Shaibu said cheaper energy would make salaries go further and lower transport costs would reduce the portion of workers’ wages spent getting to work.
He argued that the government could not make life more expensive, push students towards borrowing to cope with the consequences and then frighten them that cheaper fuel would take their loans away.