By Max Patrick Ocaido
Karamoja sub-region has been ranked the least beneficiary of the Students Loan Scheme with only 1% of the students benefiting from the project.
The students loan scheme is a fund intended to provide financing to Ugandan students who have qualified for higher education in recognized institutions of higher learning but are unable to support themselves financially.
The scheme is handled by the Higher Education Students’ Financing Board (HESFB), a body established by an Act of Parliament, to provide both Loans and Scholarships to students.
According to the Annual Report on the State of Equal Opportunities in Uganda 2018/2019 that was launched on Wednesday, Karamoja sub-region hardly had any beneficiaries accessing the program with a percentage share of one.
The report shows that over the last five years (2014-2018), students from Buganda had the highest level of access to the students’ university loan scheme with a percentage share of 24 followed by Ankole region with a percentage share of 19.
Regionally, the Western region had the highest number of beneficiaries (37%) followed by Eastern and Central region with percentage shares of (28) and (24) respectively. Northern region had the lowest number of students’ beneficiaries among all the four regions with a percentage share of 10.
Consequently, Speaker Rebecca Kadaga has called for an investigation as to why Karamoja region is the least beneficiary of the students’ loan scheme. While receiving the report from Sylvia Muwebwa Ntambi, Chairperson of the Equal Opportunities Commission (EOC), Kadaga said that there is need to probe how the people in Karamoja area get access to information about the students’ loan scheme.
“Really for Karamoja to get 1% I don’t know if you had time to interact with officials from the Higher Education Students Loan Scheme because I think we have an obligation to support minorities, do they not qualify, don’t they apply, don’t they know about it? I think we need to find out how the information reaches the beneficiaries,” Kadaga said.
In her submission, Ntambi, revealed that over the past five years, comparison between male and female student beneficiaries is much higher than that of the female counterparts with 5922 (73%) male beneficiaries compared to 220 (27.3%) female beneficiaries. She asked the Speaker to reign over Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) who have failed to implement recommendations made in their previous annual reports.
The Commission made 35 recommendations aimed at redressing imbalances that were addressed to 10 sectors. Out of the total recommendations made, sectors have demonstrated commendable commitment towards 19 recommendations.