The Federal Government says it will develop an app for applications into the student loan scheme.

This is according to the Executive Secretary of the Student Loan Scheme Board Akintunde Sawyer who spoke on Monday after the board met with President Bola Tinubu in Abuja.

Sawyer said the move is to ensure zero human intervention in the scheme which is expected to start this year.

The development came months after Tinubu said the scheme would commence in January 2024.

“By January 2024, the new student loan must commence. To the future of our children and students, we are saying no more strikes,” Tinubu said in Abuja during the National Economic Summit 2023, assuring students that the era of incessant strikes is gone.

President Tinubu in celebration of June 12, Nigeria’s Democracy Day, signed the student loan bill in fulfillment of the promise he made during his campaign.

The bill, sponsored by the Speaker of the 9th House of Representatives, Femi Gbajabiamila, now Chief of Staff to the President, provides easy access to higher education for indigent Nigerians through interest-free loans from the Nigerian Education Loan Fund.

The funds for the programme will be domiciled in the Ministry of Education and will only be accessed by indigent students of tertiary institutions.