PRESIDENTIAL SCHOLARSHIP FALLOUT,AREWA CONSULTATIVE FORUM ACF DECLARES NORTH WAS INTENTIONALY EXCLUDED

Northern leaders group known as The Arewa Consultative Forum ACF has
yesterday declared that northerners
were deliberately excluded from the recent list released by the
National Universities Commission
(NUC) for the award of a presidential scholarship to some nigerian
outstanding students. This was made known by the
national publicity secretary of ACF Anthony Sani said the list has
ignored the national consensus.
"The attention of the Arewa Consultative Forum has been
drawn to a most curious list of
candidates published in the newspapers this week who are
said to have qualified for the award of a presidential
scholarship for innovation and
development, which is designed to train and develop young
Nigerians to become
entrepreneurs capable of creating jobs, wealth and progress on their own.
"However, although the list released by the NUC is on a state
by state basis, it is not at all clear that the Commission wanted
candidates granted scholarship to come from all parts of the country.
The criteria
used to select the candidates appear delibaretly designed to exclude
those from the Northern states. It
certainly enabled the NUC to ignore the national consensus on
inclusiveness and balance of
competing demands among ethnic groups and geo political areas of the country.
"If the NUC had permitted itself
to be guided by the need for balanced development of Nigeria,it would
not have nominated a
preponderance of candidates for this vital programme from
Southern states to the near total exclusion of the Northern state. Oyo
state,for example, has 52 candidates while Sokoto, Yobe, Cross Rivers
and the FCT have nil candidate. The list itself is explanatory,
If it is a mistake, NUC should take immediate steps to correct
it,"Sani stated. Join mycampusnews on facebook at
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