The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, is grilling a former chairman of the Kwara State Scholarship Board, Mrs Fatimoh Yusuf, over an alleged N150m bursary fraud.
A credible source in the Ilorin Zone of the anti-graft agency told DAILY POST that the former chairman alongside some officials of the board allegedly connived and converted a large chunk of the 2017 and 2018 bursary funds of the state indigent students to personal use.
The source disclosed that ” less than 4,000 students of the state origin in tertiary institutions were paid bursary allowances in two years, out of the N150m released to the board to cater for about 10,000 students within the period under review.”
The immediate past government in the state reportedly released the bursary allowances to the board for onward payment to indigent students.
Affected students who petitioned the EFCC, had alleged that their names appeared as beneficiaries of the bursary allowances at the board but never received the money.
Upon investigation, aggrieved students who sighted their names, matriculation numbers and signatures got furious and insisted that their names and matriculation numbers were correct but their signatures were forged.
Officials of the board had earlier told the operatives of the agency that the students were issued cheques of which a few beneficiaries were discovered to have been handed cash.
“For scholarships, why should government pay money meant for students stipends of five thousand naira each and somebody will corner it? N50m for last year,and N100m a year before the last.
“You asked the government to write cheques, knowing full well that you will not present these cheques. Why should you ask the government to write cheques?.
“You know that these students didn’t have bank accounts why would you for goodness sake allow government to write cheques in their names, only for you to approach the Micro-finance banks to discount the cheques, collect cash. Very many of the students that came here said it is our names but we have not collected. Somebody forged our signatures for 2017 and 2018 bursary allowances. N150m is involved,” the source added.
The source said the suspects would be arraigned in court after ongoing investigation into the alleged fraud.
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