Governor Babagana Zulu of Borno state, has approved the release of N304.4 million scholarship payments to 10,118 students studying in institutions of higher learning. According to him, N624.4 million has also been paid to 23,776 students during the first phase of 2019/20 disbursements. While announcing new payments yesterday (Monday) in Maiduguri, the Commissioner of Higher Education, Dr. Babagana Mustapha Mallambe, disclosed that; “The N307.4 million second phase payments commences today, as the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) strike has been called off.” He said that because of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic and ASUU’s call of strike, the payments were made in two phases. He said students in nine of the 49 institutions of higher learning, were paid in the first phase. “The students will start to get alerts of payments from the UBA bank,” he said. While responding to demands of Executive Secretary of Scholarship Board, Adamu Usman, he said: “As you’re an adviser to the Ministry of Higher Education, we’ll look into the supply of electricity to the board’s internet café and your running costs. He noted that even though the staff are part of the Civil Service, they could use the 1% administrative charges to run the board. He however; commended the leadership of the board for going online. He said this will enable students’ access to the board’s portal for regular registrations and scholarship payments. “Without the establishment of the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) centre, you can’t do anything; including students’ usage of new portals,” he said. Mallambe therefore urged the students to be always online, so that they are updated on the happenings across the globe. On the inaccessibility of students to the internet, he said: “You should always be browsing and watching the happenings in the world. “It’s not pleased to hear that the scholarship applications; out of four million people of Borno state, only a student applied for a federal scholarship advertised online,” he said.
