Let me start with a very Nigerian question... If someone tells you, “Your student loan has been completely cancelled,” will you ask how it was cancelled, or will you just shout, “Thank God!”?
Honestly, I understand the second reaction because In Nigeria, education is not cheap... Even when you attend a public university, there are still school fees, accommodation, transportation, textbooks, feeding, internet subscription, departmental dues, handouts, clearance fees and those small-small payments that somehow become a very large amount by the end of the semester and if you are not from a family with money, sometimes your education becomes a family project.
Your mother is looking for money... your father is calling relatives... Your uncle promises to send something “next week.”.. then next week becomes next month and somehow, the student is still expected to attend lectures and behave like everything is normal.
This is why the idea of a student loan makes sense to many Nigerians.... Nigeria's current student-loan system, administered by NELFUND, provides zero-interest loans for eligible students to cover institutional charges and upkeep. According to NELFUND's current terms, repayment generally begins two years after NYSC for those who participate, with 10% of monthly salary deducted at source.
On paper, that sounds reasonable but now imagine the question being turned around... Imagine the government says “We have decided to cancel everybody's outstanding student debt.. Nobody has to pay anymore but to fund this, everyone, including you, will pay more taxes.”.. Would you still support it?
This is where my Nigerian brain starts doing calculations because Nigerians already complain about taxes, levies, electricity bills, fuel prices, transport costs and basically anything that comes with the word “increase.”
Education can create benefits that go beyond the individual who received the loan... So maybe the question isn't simply, “Why should I pay for somebody else's education?” but “What kind of society do we want to build with our taxes?”.. because taxes are already supposed to fund things that many of us don't personally use.
I may not use a particular road, but somebody else does.... That's part of living in a society.
However, there is still a very important difference between supporting education and simply cancelling every debt without asking what caused the debt in the first place.
If student loans are continuously cancelled, where does the money come from next time?
Do we increase taxes again?
Borrow more money?
Cut funding from another sector?
Print more money?... Or simply tell future students that the government will figure it out somehow?.. and this is where I think Nigerians need to have a serious conversation because debt forgiveness sounds beautiful until you ask "Who is actually paying for the forgiveness?"
There is also the question of repayment itself... A Nigerian graduate may finish school and spend months.. or even year... looking for a job and even when the job finally comes, the salary may not be enough to comfortably handle rent, transportation, food, family responsibilities and personal development.
So should repayment automatically work the same way for someone earning ₦200,000 and someone earning ₦2 million?... Should someone who is unemployed be treated the same way as someone earning a high income?
Should students who genuinely cannot repay receive temporary relief?
These questions matter...
NELFUND's terms also provide mechanisms for recovering outstanding loans, including a Global Standing Instruction that can be used to recover money from accounts in financial institutions when repayment is due and has failed... So this isn't just free money.
It is assistance today with an obligation attached to it...
Personally, I think that distinction is important... As Nigerians, we need education to be accessible. But we also need systems that can survive beyond one administration, one budget or one political promise.
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