Tuition fraud: Ex-female worker, students defraud Ondo varsity of N457m

Achievers University, Owo, Ondo State, has said it concluded the Students’ Fees Payment Audit Exercise on Friday, and that the exercise revealed that some members of staff and students had defrauded the varsity of N457,508,645.00.

According to the institution, the accused persons were found to have hacked into the students’ payment portal and lured 320 students into paying their fees into the personal accounts of a female worker, while the accused cleared their bills on the university portal to enable the students to obtain their financial clearance.

The acting Vice-Chancellor of the university, Prof. Oyesoji Aremu, disclosed this in a statement issued and made available to our correspondent on Monday.

According to the statement, the VC explained that the concluded exercise required every student to appear before an investigative committee as the fraud took place in the 2023/2024, 2024/2025, and 2025/2026 academic sessions.

The statement read in parts, “The exercise has revealed that the fraud was masterminded by a female worker, an alumnus of the Department of Accounting of our university, who was later employed to work at the university bursary. She resigned from the services of the university in April 2025.

“The fraudulent activities affected three academic sections: 2023/2024, 2024/2025, and 2025/2026 Academic Sessions and 320 students paid a total sum of N457,508,645:00 school fees into the personal account of the said lady, who in turn fraudulently cleared such students on the portal without the university receiving the money. Many of the students were lured to pay into her account by the offer of discounted fees/ commission.

“Eleven members of staff and 34 students were used as agents of the said female worker to ‘recruit’ students for the fraudulent activities. One external person working at Federal Medical Centre Owo was also indicted as having served as an agent of the fraudulent activities.”

The Achievers University boss noted that all the 320 indicted students, and the six students who acted as agents, will be made to face the students’ disciplinary committee to further explain to the university authority what motivated them to disregard the well-laid-down fees payment procedures.

“The 11 members of staff who infamously acted as agents for the said mastermind will also face the senior staff disciplinary committee, while the said mastermind is under police investigation for subsequent prosecution.”

He added that the students’ fees payment audit would continue, as every payment made by students who graduated in the last two sessions will be carefully audited.

“We have the approval of Council to exhibit absolute transparency in handling the investigation and dissemination of information to the university community, so as to eliminate rumor mongering and misinformation,” the statement concluded. (Punch)