The federal government, on Thursday, January 15, proposed a total of ₦113,764,000,000 billion for key interventions in the education sector for the 2026 fiscal year.
An examination of the 2026 appropriation bill lists the interventions to include school feeding, scholarships, out-of-school children programmes and security infrastructure across unity colleges.
President Bola Tinubu had, on December 19, 2025, presented the budget estimate, totalling N58.18tn to a joint session of the national assembly.
A breakdown of the education allocation showed that N28bn was earmarked for the provision of security infrastructure in 118 unity colleges, including perimeter fencing and solar-powered electricity.
The government also set aside N1.4bn for the servicing and verification of 8,337 scholars under the federal government scholarship awards for the years 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022 and 2023.
The beneficiaries are students in public tertiary institutions.
In addition, N42bn was proposed for the school nutrition feeding programme for primary school pupils, while N35bn was allocated to support the out-of-school children project, aimed at reducing the number of children without access to basic education.
Further breakdown showed that N5.6bn was provided for the servicing of 1,532 ongoing Bilateral Education Agreement (BEA) scholars studying in donor countries.
The allocation covers supplementation allowance, medical and health insurance, warm clothing, postgraduate allowance and passages.
The scholars are studying in Russia, China, Cuba, Romania, Turkey, Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco, Serbia, Hungary, Ukraine, Mexico, Venezuela and Kazakhstan.
The government also proposed N1.7bn for the conduct and implementation of 300 fresh scholarships for Nigerians to study in countries with BEA with Nigeria, as well as for monitoring the achievement level of scholars in the same countries
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