The Higher Educations Loans Board (HELB) has released a report detailing how billions were shared among university students in the Financial Year 2020/2021.
According to the report made public on Friday, October 22, it indicates that the government channeled Ksh14.4 billion to various students drawn from different parts of the country. 354,069 students in public universities were the beneficiaries of the loans.
In terms of counties, Kakamega and Bungoma topped with the highest number of beneficiaries. Governor Wycliffe Oparanya led county had 23,967 beneficiaries in public universities getting Ksh870.93 million loan in that financial year.
Bungoma had 18,116 as beneficiaries who received Ksh725.06 million. Nakuru county under Governor Lee Kinyanjui came in third on the rank with 16,888 students getting Ksh684.9 million.
The report further ranked Homa Bay fourth with 6,811 learners benefiting from Ksh698.41 million. Kisii County closed the top five list with 16,753 beneficiaries getting Ksh679,470 million.
Coast and North Eastern counties got the least share.
HELB Chief Executive Officer, Charles Ringera, noted that they have been working with different stakeholders from different counties to ensure more needy students get the loans.
“We have been giving them analyses of courses being studied by these students,” he said, adding that this enables county governments to use the data for planning purposes.
Bomet had 13,204 learners benefiting from the HELB loans. Siaya had 13,141, Kisumu 12,969 while 12, 210 students from Nairobi benefited.
Other counties which had learners receiving the 10,000 mark include Makueni (11,609), Kericho (11,885), Kiambu (11,285), Meru (11,039), Uasin Gishu (11,198), Kitui (10,714) and Migori (10,476).
Machakos, Trans Nzoia, Nyamira, Busia, Nandi, and Muranga counties had beneficiaries above 9,000 receiving the loans.
Garissa only 71 received, Mandera 72, Tana River 272 while Isiolo closed the bottom five with 268 students who benefited.
The report comes just after Ringera on Monday, September 6, indicated that the loan would be slashed to Ksh38,000, down from the previous amount of Ksh45,000 that each student was eligible to.
Justifying the move, he stated that the government had reduced the amount of money disbursed to the board thus forcing them to slash the amount in order to continue benefiting more students.
