The Kwara State Government in 2017 and 2018 released the sum of N150m as bursary allowances for 10,000 students, who are indigenes of the state in various tertiary institutions.
The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission has begun investigations into an allegation of N150m bursary fraud against the board chairperson and some management staff of the Kwara State Scholarship Board.
This was revealed in a statement by the media head of the commission, Mr Gbenga Adewoye, in Ilorin, the capital, on Thursday.
The statement said the Kwara State Government in 2017 and 2018 released the sum of N150m as bursary allowances for 10,000 students, who are indigenes of the state in various tertiary institutions.
It was gathered that the board did not pay up to 4,000 students and fraudulently converted the remaining money to personal use.
During interrogation by EFCC officials, many of the students alleged that the names and matriculation numbers they submitted were correct but their signatures were allegedly forged by the board.
The statement reads, “The petitioners, who are students in various higher institutions of learning, had alleged that their names appeared as beneficiaries of bursary allowances at the Kwara State Scholarship Board but that they never received the money.
“They claimed not to have been the original beneficiaries of the controversial bursary allowance despite their particulars on the scholarship board documents.”
As at the time of filing in this report, officials of the board are still being interrogated by the operatives of the commission.