Monday, April 20, 2015

Buhari Urged To Cancel FG-Sponsored Foreign Scholarships

Nigeria's Commonwealth Youth Council has pleaded with the president-elect, General Muhammadu Buhari, to cancel foreign scholarships in the country after he assumes power.

The CYC chairperson, Ahmed Adamu said in London that the FG spent close to N100bn annually on foreign scholarships and it was causing a devaluation of the naira.

He said, “This figure is extremely higher when adding the cost of other self-sponsored foreign education programmes and I am using this medium to call on the Nigerian President-elect to consider this as one of the immediate policies he will adopt in the first 100 days in office.

“Nigerians and other internationals studying in United Kingdom contribute 2.3 per cent to Britain’s Gross Domestic Product growth and their patronages contribute 2.6 per cent to the overall UK employment. How different are foreign universities from Nigerian universities?

“We may talk about access to energy, Information Technology, resources, facilities, conducive atmosphere and efficiency, but all these can be provided in all Nigerian universities with the savings that will eventuate from abolishing foreign scholarships. If you divide N100 billion by the number of federal universities, you will see that each university will get N2.5 billion a year.”

Source: #PUNCH