Three graduates of the Federal Polytechnic, Offa, Kwara State, have
died in a fatal accident while travelling to Katsina State to
participate in the mandatory one-year National Youth Service Corps
(NYSC) scheme.
The incident took place at Mokwa, Niger State, last Thursday when an
articulated vehicle ran over an 18-passenger Toyota bus in which the
victims were travelling.
According to an eyewitness, the bus made a stopover at Mokwa for the
passengers to eat, after which they continued their journey.
“The bus was about to link the Jebba/Mokwa Expressway when an oncoming
articulated vehicle ran over it and killed all the passengers except
the driver,” the eyewitness said.
One of the deceased, Fakayode Oluwatoyin, was a Mass Communication graduate.
Confirming the incident, the institution’s spokesperson, Olayinka
Iroye, said, “Two of them hailed from Iwo in Osun State, but I am not
sure of where the third hailed from.”
He added that their parents had been notified of the incident.
Meanwhile, the NYSC Foundation has said it is currently searching for
about 75 ex-corps members who fled with about N16m business loans
given to them, after using their discharge certificates as collateral.
The NYSC Foundation noted that it may be forced to contact the
Economic and Financial Crimes Commission to recover the N16m loans
which the former corps members had failed to repay for several years.
The NYSC Foundation Chief Executive Officer, Bako Ventim, stated this
in an interview with newsmen in Abuja on Friday, during a soft loan
disbursement programme at the NYSC Headquarters.
He added that the discharge certificates of the 75 defaulting ex-corps
members were with the foundation and would soon be published in the
national dailies except they paid.
Ventim noted that the inability of the fleeing corps members to repay
the loans had hindered more ex-corps members from benefiting in the
financial empowerment.
He said, “We have their NYSC certificates with us and at some point;
we were wondering whether those certificates were fake. We had to link
up with the certificates department which confirmed to us that the
certificates were genuine. We have their certificates; they have our
money.
“We have a lot of defaulters. Please come and repay the loans before
we get Ibrahim Magu (EFCC acting Chairman) to help us recover the
loans.
“It is an unfortunate development that some former corps members
benefited from this loan scheme but have neglected the repayment of
the loans.
“But we don’t want to get to this point because they were corps
members; yet we are looking forward to that. We have over N16m out
there in loans.”
The NYSC Director-General, Brig Gen Shuaibu Ibrahim, urged the new
beneficiaries of the loans to ensure “timely repayment to enable
others to benefit in future.”
