THE Higher Education Students Loans Boars (HESLB) intends to collect 200bn/- from loans recovery, parliament was told here yesterday.
Deputy Minister for Education, Science and Technology, William Ole Nasha, said on Friday when responding to a supplementary question posed by Special Seats lawmaker, Susan Lyimo, that the government was satisfied by the ongoing trend at HESLB on loan recovery from beneficiaries.
In her question, Ms Lyimo expressed dismay on loans recovery, saying after the 15 per cent increment on deductions, some beneficiaries were forced to clear their outstanding debts for a period of up to 30 years, something which was unrealistic as some beneficiaries die even before clearing the debts.
According to the MP, as of 2019, only 11,000 out of 500,000 loan beneficiaries (an equivalent of 2,3per cent) had cleared their debts, meaning that it was difficult to collect debts from the remaining number of people.
The Special Seats MP wanted to know if the government had plans to amend the law in order to have debts recovered at faster speed.
But Mr Ole Nasha said since the amendment of the law in 2016, the government was satisfied by the speed by which the debts were being cleared.
“In this financial year, we expect to collect 200bn/- against 183bn/-that we collected last year, and as of now we don’t see any need to amend the law and if there are needs to amend it, an MP can move a private motion if it may be deemed fit,’’ he said.
Statistics from HESLB show that the board’s loan recoveries have within four years increased almost ten times, from 21bn/-in 2014/15 to 183bn/-in the 2018/19 fiscal year.
And, during the board’s 14 years of operations, the government has disbursed 3.8tri/-to 400,100 students of higher learning institutions, with 1.8tri/-or 47 per cent of the entire disbursement released within the four years of President Magufuli’s administration so far.
The number of beneficiaries also increased from 100,936 in 2014/15 to 128,285 students this academic year.
Mr Badru said under President Magufuli, the government has been releasing students’ loans on time, making students’ unrest in higher learning institutions unheard of.
In another development, Ms Lyimo who was working at the University of Dar es Salaam’s office of Dean of Students before joining politics, was also unhappy with the trend of suspending student leaders who were organizing strikes when HESLB delayed disbursement of students loans.
But, the Minister for Education Science and Technology, Professor Joyce Ndalichako said the government was not frustrating students, but instead asking students leaders to use the right means in pushing for their demands.
On loans delays, Prof Ndalichako said there were no delays for students who filled their forms properly as the money was available.
The minister said that some students were not filling the forms appropriately and that was why loans disbursement was being delayed.
“But we understand that students’ leaders are a bridge between the government and students, therefore we request them to use the right means when arguing their cases instead of issuing statements that disrespect authorities,’’ she noted.
