The University of Calabar (UNICAL) has refunded tuition fees to 1,089 students under the Nigerian Education Loan Fund (NELFUND) scheme, reaffirming its commitment to transparency, accountability and efficient service delivery as it continues processing payments for more beneficiaries through a newly introduced automated refund portal.
The institution disclosed the development on Friday in Calabar, with the NELFUND Desk Officer, Dr. Elizabeth Effiwatt, dismissing claims that the university had failed to refund students who had paid their tuition fees before receiving NELFUND disbursements.
Speaking on the refund exercise, Effiwatt said the university had successfully completed nine batches of manual refunds, describing the process as continuous and transparent.
"We have completed nine batches of manual refunds to 1,089 students. It is wrong for anyone to say UNICAL has not refunded. We are refunding, and the process is ongoing," she said.
She provided a detailed breakdown of the beneficiaries across the completed batches. According to her, the first batch comprised 198 students, while the second, third and fourth batches covered 104, 106 and 105 students respectively. She added that an additional 168 students in the fourth batch received payments to correct balance discrepancies caused by system glitches.
Effiwatt further disclosed that the fifth batch comprised 26 students, while the sixth, seventh, eighth and ninth batches covered 141, 99, 62 and 80 students respectively.
She commended President Bola Tinubu for introducing the NELFUND initiative, describing it as a transformative intervention aimed at expanding access to higher education and reducing the financial burden on Nigerian students. She also praised the Managing Director of NELFUND, Mr. Akintunde Sawyerr, for his leadership in driving the programme.
Providing further insight into the refund process, the university's Director of Information and Communication Technology (ICT), Dr. Eyo Essien, explained that the refunds are specifically for students who had already paid their tuition fees before NELFUND released funds directly to the university.
Essien announced that UNICAL has now migrated from a manual refund process to a fully digital platform designed to simplify applications and improve efficiency.
According to him, the newly developed portal allows eligible students to submit refund requests electronically without visiting any university office, eliminating unnecessary delays and reducing opportunities for exploitation by middlemen.
He revealed that within less than one month of launching the platform, no fewer than 2,090 students had successfully submitted refund applications online, demonstrating widespread acceptance of the innovation.
Essien noted that processing of a new phase of refunds was temporarily suspended to enable reconciliation of applicants' records and ensure that all payments are accurate and transparent. He, however, assured affected students that refund disbursements would resume once the verification exercise is completed.
He added that the digital platform enables applicants to monitor the status of their requests in real time through a personalised dashboard, where they can also view their payment balances and other relevant information from their mobile phones or computers.
The ICT director described the platform as one of the most seamless student refund systems currently being implemented by any tertiary institution in Nigeria, noting that UNICAL is among the first universities in the country to deploy such an automated solution for NELFUND refund processing.
University officials reiterated their commitment to ensuring that all eligible students receive their refunds promptly, while encouraging beneficiaries to utilise the online portal for future applications as the institution continues to enhance transparency, efficiency and accountability in the administration of the NELFUND scheme..
