Over 100 Colleges of Education, Polytechnic and University lecturers on federal government scholarship for Masters and PhD degrees in the United Kingdom, through the Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFUND), are about to return home empty-handed because of shortfalls in grants, reports Sunday Oguntola
FATAI Afolabi, a lecturer at the Osun State Polytechnic Iree, pumped his fists and let out a cry of eureka after receiving a letter from the Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFund). That was in 2015. The entire institution was in frenzy. His co-lecturers soon joined in the victory dance; the feeling was infectious, one of them was on the way to earning a PhD on the bill of the federal government! What a great luck.
Afolabi has joined the exclusive class of government-sponsored scholars. He is to travel overseas for his PhD. It was the culmination of years of toiling and applications. He had beaten thousand other applicants across the nation to win the coveted government sponsorship.
But the joy of Afolabi and almost hundred other scholars have been short-lived, or so it seems for now. They have been left in the limbo in different universities in far-away United Kingdom (UK). Most of them today cannot pay tuition fees or register for the ongoing study years.
In fact, one of them has been withdrawn. Last March, Emmanuel Alhassan Kamba was booted out of University of Sussex where he was undergoing a PhD programme under the scheme. The letter dated March 22 gave him a 14-day ultimatum to balance his outstanding tuition fee.
Kamba, a lecturer with The Federal University, Wukari, has since returned home following inability to pay up the balance. One after the other, the scholars are facing similar threat and possibility of withdrawal from the UK for the same reason.
The implication is the essence of a well-conceived scheme that is about to be altogether defeated. At risk are the billions of naira and hard currencies already invested in the scheme. The careers of the scholars are also at stake as they are frustrated and unable to continue schooling in the UK.
Well-thought out initiative
Tagged Academic Staff Training and Development (AST&D), the scheme initiated by the federal government is to expose research-minded lecturers to the best of training worldwide for the overall benefit of the tertiary education sector.
AST&D scholars, as the successful candidates, are known go through a tedious screening process from their institutions to TETFund before accessing the grants. Upon receipts, they sign a bond to return to their home institutions and serve for the equivalent of their study years.
For administrative conveniences, the scholars have the option of local or overseas studies. The local scholars get N1.5m in three years for PhD programmes while PhDs for arts-related studies cost N350,000 per annum. All local PhD studies are expected to be completed within three years.
Masters programmes have the maximum of two years with sciences getting N350, 000 yearly for the local scholars. Master of Arts local programme is entitled to N250, 000 per scholar every year.
While the local scholars have little or no hitches, their overseas counterparts are experiencing serious glitches threatening their studies and the funds invested in the scheme.
During the duration of the approved studies, the overseas scholars are entitled to full tuition cover, Bench Fees, living expenses, health insurance and passage, according to a 2014 Guidelines for accessing the fund by TETFUND.
The guideline further indicates the provision of “variation of costs on annual tuitions only but subject to confirmation from the foreign university where the AST&D scholars are studying.”
Foreign PhDs have a maximum of three and half years for completion while Masters are for a maximum of 18 months. Bench Work (time allocated for research programme) period varies from three months to one year as applicable to each scholar.
According to a bond signed by AST&D scholars obtained by our correspondent, they are expected to serve the institution for a period equivalent to the years of study or refund costs expended on them in addition to liquidated damages.
Those who abandon the programme and return to the institutions will have to refund the expenses incurred in the course of the study. Those who abandon the programme and refuse to return to the institutions will be considered to have absconded leading to summary dismissal.
Exchange rate setbacks
The overseas scholars are experiencing hardship because of shortfalls in released grants. In 2015 when they won the scholarship, the grants were awarded at the cost of N260-N280 to one pound. But a number of global and Nigerian economic realities have made nonsense of the grants.
A pound exchanges at N500-N600 at the black market today. Ordinarily that rate shouldn’t have affected the scholars. But the grants were released to their institutions in naira as against pounds. If they were released in pounds, the scholars would have been insulated from the increase in rate exchange.
The implication is their institutions release the grants to them every year in naira, leaving the scholars with only the option of accessing British pounds through black market. Transfers for payment of tuitions through commercial banks have not helped either because they are also charged at black market rate.
“Whatever was approved for us in 2015 has lost value and is not up to what we need again for tuition,” Afolabi informed our correspondent. “For instance, when I secured admission at the University of Sussex in 2015, the tuition was $17,850. I deferred because fund was not released on time.
“By the time the admission took effect in August 2016, the tuition has risen to $18,300. That is an increase of $1,500 in just a little over a year. But the fund was released based on the 2015 estimate. The challenge is how is one expected to get the shortfall?”
Inadequate tuition fees
This case is applicable to all the scholars in the UK. The approved tuition is not up to the released sum while the fund has also lost value because of the rise in exchange rate. This means many of them cannot naturally pay their tuitions.
Those who managed to forge on through self-sponsorship or assistance don’t know how to fund the shortfall for the coming years. It leaves them in a state of uncertainty and frustration, affecting their full concentration on their studies.
Sadly enough, the need to finish up within the approved duration of studies means they cannot work while in the UK. In the first place, they don’t have working permits. Besides, the loaded working schedules mean they have no time to spare for working.
It means they are practically left on their own with only the grants to live on. Their families back home also have to look for alternative means of survival when many of them being breadwinners are away studying in higher qualifications.
“Many of us cannot even study well again. I mean, it is natural that we are bothered because we don’t know where the next fee will come from considering the shortfall,” a female scholar at the University of Manchester confided.
Besides shortfalls in tuitions, increased cost of living is also a great bother to the scholars. Even in a structured economy like UK, cost of living increases by as much as 2.5 percent yearly. But the scholars are placed on a fixed rate for living expenses.
“We see our counterparts from other nations and realise they are very fully focused and unbothered. Their governments take good care of their living expenses. They don’t have anything to worry about.
“But we keep suffering because we cannot even lead an average life. We could barely afford the necessities of life because of the increase in costs that are not accommodated in what we get,” another scholar stated.
The scholars on whose shoulders the dream of the nation’s tertiary education partly rest are daunted by living expenses in a far-away nation, unable to concentrate on why they were sponsored there in the first instance.
Bogged down by these fundamental challenges, the scholars on October 25, 2016 wrote a letter to the Executive Secretary of TETFUND, Dr. Abdullahi Baffa for intervention. It was the least they thought they could do to ameliorate their plights.
After appreciating the Fund for considering them worthy of the scheme, the scholars said: “However, we wish to most respectfully bring to your notice the worsening conditions and financial challenges faced by TETFund scholars in the UK, which has resulted from the persistent devaluation of naira in recent months.
“… For those who were able to get their second or third installment released, the amount was not enough to pay the school fees. The trend now is that institutions no longer make a foreign transfer in payment of school fees at the official rate.
“Rather, they provide cash in naira to scholars. To pay school fees, one has to purchase pounds and obtain Form A through commercial banks which transfer these monies at their convenience and at an almost open market rate.
“The consequence of this is that such scholars are left with nothing for living/accommodation/ field /trip/ conference for the whole year.”
Case for upward reviews
They solicited for upward reviews of the tuition fees as indicated by the guidelines of the Fund. They said: “This we believe will go a long way in ameliorating our conditions and encouraging us to be the best we can for the good of our beloved country Nigeria.”
More than two months after, they got a response from Baffa. But it was not the one they anticipated. He said: “As a matter of policy, the Fund does not deal directly with individuals or groups of scholars on the issue of sponsorship, except through their home institutions.”
That, more or less, shattered their hope for a review of their grants. Undeterred, they proceeded to the House of Representatives Speaker Yakubu Dogara.
“The letter to the Executive Secretary was birthed from the unfavourable responses we got from our various employers. It is unfortunate and disheartening that our appeal to TETFund has not received any favourable considerations either,” they wrote to Dogara.
But nothing has since happened in that regards. Yet, the scholars’ ordeals have remained unabated. If anything, they have even escalated. Afolabi believes the demand for upward review is more than justified.
“Our request for upward review is based on the provision of the guidelines for accessing TETFund intervention funds, 2014. More so, the application for upward review is peculiar to each scholar. It is submitted through his/her home Institution’s/employer’s academic staff training and development (AST&D) committee to audit before handing over to the Executive Secretary of TETFund for approval and subsequent release of funds,” he argued.
Asked if the scholars are asking for too much, Afolabi explained: “First, I will like to say that neither me nor any scholar requesting for upward review of study funds is an Oliver Twist. Why? As much as we appreciate the opportunity given us, we are not doing it for free. We have signed a good percent of our lives (the number of years taken to earn the qualification, PhD) to our home institutions in a “bond” to be repaid with hard work and intellectual contributions to the country.
“Secondly, this will not be the first time a scholar will be requesting for upward review of his/her study funds. There are more than a hundred scholars whose study funds were reviewed in the past for the same or even trivial reasons compared to what we are experiencing.
“Thirdly, the Executive Secretary of TETFund himself is aware of the currency fluctuations against the Naira in recent times. Lastly, we have supplied more than enough genuine evidence to back our request for upward review of study funds.”
Billions gone down the drains?
Without the review, Afolabi paints the scenario of what will happen. “If the review does not take place, the funds spent so far on each scholar will be as good as wasted funds.
“This is because neither the scholar nor the country will benefit from such flippancy as the scholars will be sent back without certificates. It will also mean that a good percentage of the scholar’s time and efforts (life) will have been wasted without cause.
“Over 100 PhD TETFund scholars across UK Universities are at the verge of being thrown out of their study institutions.”
Mum from TETFund
Last week, our correspondent tried severally to get official reactions from TETFund to no avail. The mobile phone of the Executive Secretary, Dr Abdullahi Baffa kept answering “switched off.”
Calls to the Communications Director of the Fund, Mr. Ben, were not answered. Text messages to him were also not replied as at the time of filing this report.
The question is: what next for these scholars?
