The administration of the immediate past Kano State Governor, Abdullahi Umar Ganduje, spent over N20 billion on 111,687 indigent students for overseas post-graduate scholarships in 14 countries, five private universities, the Nigerian Law School, and other internal universities from June 2015 to March 2023, a former commissioner has said.
The former Commissioner for Information and Internal Affairs in Ganduje’s administration, Muhammad Garba, revealed this in a statement made available to The PUNCH against the background of a false claim by the New Nigeria Peoples Party that Ganduje did not pay foreign scholarships in his two-term administration of the state.
According to him, the amount covered tuition fees, upkeep, accommodation, and air tickets, among others, which was earmarked for students on post-graduate scholarships in India, Malaysia, Egypt, Cyprus, China, Turkey, Uganda, United Kingdom, Togo, Ireland, Gambia, and Ukraine, as well as internal universities.
Garba said available records indicated that in addition to the above, the former administration equally sponsored 50 lecturers from its two universities and other tertiary institutions for their doctorate degrees in prestigious French universities under a programme that was a joint venture between the French and Kano State governments.
Similarly, the commissioner pointed out that over N600 million was also spent on the joint tuition-free postgraduate scholarship between the state government and the French Embassy in Nigeria.
He, therefore, noted that it was unfortunate that the current government in the state was laying claims to the success of foreign and local scholarship.
He added that the Rabiu Kwankwaso government left a burden of about $28 million and over N6 billion, of which the Ganduje administration had settled more than 80 percent.
Furthermore, Garba stated that the post-graduate students were dispatched in three batches to top-ranking universities in France and some European countries, primarily to study science-related courses.
Also, the commissioner noted that the Ganduje-led administration re-introduced the payment of scholarship allowances to indigenous students attending Nigerian universities and other tertiary institutions, which was completely abandoned by the Kwankwaso administration between 2011 and 2015.