The Nigerian Education Loan Fund (NELFUND) has announced plans to introduce an online portal that will allow parents to verify whether their children’s tuition fees have been paid under the student loan scheme.
The proposed platform is designed to prevent students whose fees have been covered by NELFUND from collecting additional tuition money from their parents without disclosing their funding status.
NELFUND Managing Director and Chief Executive, Akintunde Sawyerr, disclosed this at a press conference in Abuja on Wednesday, October 28, 2026.
He explained that parents would be able to enter their children’s matriculation numbers to check whether their tuition fees had been settled or remained outstanding. The portal would display payment status without revealing the amount paid or other sensitive financial information.
Sawyerr said the initiative followed concerns that some students benefiting from the loan scheme continued to request tuition payments from their parents despite having their fees covered by the Fund.
“This development is based on us recognising that there are still many students out there who are double dipping; they’re taking from NELFUND and still stressing their parents. So we’re going to put an end to that,” he said.
The initiative also follows concerns raised in August by the Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, Taiwo Oyedele, who suggested that some students might have received NELFUND loans without their parents’ knowledge.
Beyond the parents’ verification portal, the Fund is introducing a restricted digital wallet system that will enable students to authorise approved tuition payments directly to their institutions.
Under the proposed arrangement, funds for approved fees will be credited to a digital wallet linked to the beneficiary’s institution. Students will then be able to authorise payments through their phones without receiving the money as cash or having it transferred into their personal bank accounts.
Sawyerr said the system was intended to address cases in which students independently paid their fees because they were unaware that NELFUND had already settled their bills. Such situations had sometimes resulted in duplicate payments and difficulties obtaining refunds from institutions.
He explained that each digital token would be linked to a designated institution, preventing students from diverting the funds to other purposes.
“We’re placing the power for payment in the hands of the students. The power for payment to the institution is going to now be walletised so that they can click on their phone and the institution can be paid,” he said.
NELFUND Executive Director, Mustapha Iyal, said the wallet-based payment system was undergoing pilot implementation, with more than 400,000 applications in the system at the time of the briefing.
He added that the arrangement was expected to take effect in the 2026/2027 academic session, with the Fund working to ensure that institutions acknowledge payments promptly and students receive timely notifications.
Iyal advised prospective beneficiaries to apply for loans early rather than waiting until examination periods or payment deadlines, warning that late applications could lead to avoidable payment complications.
Sawyerr also announced plans for two-day regional workshops across Nigeria’s six geopolitical zones to prepare tertiary institutions, students and other stakeholders for the upgraded NELFUND 2.0 application system.
The workshops are expected to involve institutional heads, bursars, information technology administrators, students and community representatives. They will focus on improving application processing, verification procedures, technical readiness and public awareness.
According to Sawyerr, NELFUND has more than one million beneficiaries and expects demand to increase significantly, with applications potentially reaching two million. He clarified that the projection refers to applications, not an increase in available funding.
He said the Fund was strengthening its technological infrastructure, administrative processes and institutional support systems to manage the anticipated demand.
The proposed portal and digital wallet system form part of NELFUND’s efforts to improve transparency, reduce payment errors and strengthen accountability in the administration of student loans.
However, the parents’ portal remains a proposed initiative, while the digital wallet system is undergoing pilot implementation. Further details on the portal’s launch date and public access arrangements are yet to be provided.
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