Nigerian students sponsored by the Kano State Government to study in Elrazi University, Sudan have been barred from attending classes over failure of the government to pay their fees and other allowances.
Daily Trust obtained a letter of notification to that effect, dated 15th Oct 2018, which was addressed to the state government through the State Scholarship Board.
It reads: “It is important to notify you that from today 15/10/2018 none of your students will be allowed into their normal classes failure to settle their outstanding Fees.”
It further said: “It may interest you to know that being absent for a month will affect their attendance and chance of graduating.”
The President of Kano State Sponsored Students, Sudan, Saddiq Abdullahi Ubajalli who confirmed the situation to Daily Trust said: “Please we need help in our situation, till now the Government hasn’t done anything and I swear to God the students are in hardship situation.”
He said Elrazi University barred Kano Scholarship students from entering even the university compound.
“The university sent them a lot of notifications before they finally took the decision, the Government did not respond to even a single letter that is the reason they barred the students.”
He said: “Government now owes the students 21 months Upkeeps and 11 months accommodation fees, the students are in critical condition.”
He disclosed that 10 female students that already graduate since August from Omdurman Islamic University were denied their result because the government did not settles their fees.
However, Daily Trust saw letters of notifications dated 24/8/2018 addressed to Kano state scholarship board, Executive Governor Office, Commissioner of Education and the Commissioner of Finance notifying them of the need to clear the outstanding fees.
Responding, the Kano State Commissioner of Information, Malam Muhammad Garba confirmed that Kano State government is owing the students some allowances, but said that their school fees had been paid up to the time they would graduate.
He said though they were not the only students being owed by government efforts were on to offset their allowances.
He said, “This is a problem we inherited from previous government and I can tell you we have so far offset over N5bn pending school fees and other allowances for Kano indigenes studying in various private universities in Nigeria.
“About two weeks ago, we paid over N500m as allowances to such students. So, I can assure you government will do everything possible to address this problem very soon.”
