There is a buzz in Esther Abu’s house, where mother and daughters have just heard of a new law that will see poor Nigerian families given loans to send their children to college.
Ms. Abu’s youngest daughter, a teenager who talks like she raps, is leaving high school next month. She loves computers but knows that her mother, a single mother whose salary as a street sweeper barely provides enough food for the family – and must be supplemented by alms given mainly by her church – does not have the money to send him to college.
Her eldest graduated from high school two years ago and immediately started working as a hairdresser to support the family who live in Mararaba, a congested suburb on the outskirts of Abuja.
“As a girl, I dreamed of working as a doctor,” says 21-year-old Eunice.
Both now have a chance, albeit slim, of rekindling their dreams, as the government says it will start paying school fees for people from these poor backgrounds. However, many questions have been raised about the scheme.
Since coming to power in late May, President Bola Tinubu has carried out a series of reforms at lightning speed – ending fuel subsidies, devaluing the naira, sacking the central bank chief and security chiefs – and his latest goals are to reorganize Nigeria. struggling higher education sector.
For decades, fees have been kept low by the government to encourage enrollment in a country where many are poor and illiteracy levels are high.
While medical students at the University of Lagos in Nigeria’s wealthiest state pay just 25,000 naira (£32; $26) a year, their peers at the University of Ghana in Accra pay 3,500 cedis (£242, $308).
But such low fees have not been matched by government funding over time, leading to schools with outdated equipment, overcrowded classrooms, and low pay for teachers and other staff.
The average Nigerian university professor earns less than 500,000 naira (£570; $725) a month, while a graduate assistant receives 160,000.
These conditions have led to relentless strikes, which saw universities closed for eight months last year – the ninth shutdown in 13 years.
Strikes and lack of adequate funding have eroded confidence in Nigerian public universities, forcing people to enroll in expensive private institutions or study abroad, particularly in Eastern Europe.
By introducing the loans, President Tinubu gave universities carte blanche to raise tuition fees, which the government believes students from poor families can now afford.
The president said the program will “expand access to education for all Nigerians, regardless of background.”
The interest-free loan will be repaid in the form of monthly deductions of 10% from the beneficiaries’ salaries two years after completing compulsory post-graduate paramilitary service.
“But what if they finish school and can’t find a job?” Ms. Abu asks in a low voice that muffles the room.
It’s a question that has been repeated across Nigeria by students and their parents since the program was announced two weeks ago.
Every year, a large number of graduates enter the Nigerian job market, but only a few find employment.
In the last survey, in 2020, a third of those who wanted to work were unemployed, and millions of graduates were working in jobs below their skills, such as working as a hairdresser.
“I know at least 200 graduates from my village who went back to agriculture after going to school because they had no job,” says Ayuba Mayah, a student at the College of Education in Zuba, Abuja .
He won’t take the loan, he says, to avoid this burden hanging around his neck while he looks for a job after graduating. Instead, he works to pay for his studies.
Aminu Sadiya and Mercy Sunday, who are both studying economics at the same university, agree that finding a job is their main concern when it comes to borrowing money.
“My parents didn’t think of a loan before sending me to school, they will find a way to pay the school fees,” says Ms Sunday, whose parents are farmers.
Although Mr Tinubu has promised to halve the unemployment rate in three years by creating millions of jobs for young people, the new law is silent on graduates who cannot repay the loan because they are at the unemployment.
However, those who become self-employed risk a two-year prison sentence or a fine if they refuse to repay the loan up to 10% of their monthly profits.
But the loan is not available to everyone – it is specifically targeted at students who come from households with an income of less than 500,000 naira per year.
In theory, millions could benefit, but the conditions for obtaining a loan are strict.
Poor families will have to prove that they earn so little, which means they will have to provide bank statements that many of them are unlikely to have.
Candidates are also required to provide at least two guarantors:
It was pointed out that poor Nigerians are unlikely to know of such people and when they do, they are unlikely to have such a person vouch for a loan.
Even after meeting the requirements, applicants are not guaranteed the loan as it is subject to the availability of funds.
“They should just say they don’t want anyone accessing the loan,” says Vanessa Macaulay, a third-year mass communication student at Yaba College of Technology in Lagos.
The president of the university teachers’ union also describes the loan conditions as “impractical”, adding that more than 90% of students will not meet the “requirements”.
But other scholars such as Professor Mudashiru Mohammed, who heads the education management department at Lagos State University, say that despite tuition fees of just 30,000 naira (£34, $43 ) per semester, many of its students cannot pay.
He says the conditions were necessary to ensure people paid, in a country where most see government loans as free money.
Although it is difficult to gauge the financial background of students in public graduate schools, many at the University of Abuja tell the BBC they come from low-income homes.
Their education is funded by parents and guardians who are junior government officials, private security guards and company drivers.
The combined incomes of these families are often just above the threshold, putting loans out of reach, even if they are not well off by Nigerian standards.
These families have already been hit by transport fares which have doubled, while the cost of food has also skyrocketed recently.
Now they will have to deal with tuition fees that have increased in some universities – which are considering increases since last year – of up to 200%.
The loan is strictly for tuition fees and excludes other costs such as accommodation and food, which generally represent a higher proportion of the total cost of college.
“If they don’t pay for everything, then what’s the point? Who will buy books, pay for the hostel, get food,” Ms. Abu asks, the chatter long extinguished in her home.
“They should have made the loans available to every student,” says Caleb Issac, a self-sponsored part-time student at National Open University Abuja.
In his spare time, he works as a marketing agent for a transport company and fears that a rise in fees will hurt him.
This is not Nigeria’s first student loan attempt – an original plan in 1972 by the military government collapsed because recipients refused to repay, says Professor Mohammed.
“Maybe the president should have focused on job creation first,” Ms Abu said.
The lack of jobs, the other costs involved and the lack of clarity about what will happen to employees who don’t repay mean the loan isn’t working for her family, she says.
“Better for my daughters to learn trades and get odd jobs than to go to school and face jail,” she says.