The Northern group has criticised the Tinubu government for abandoning the Bilateral Education Agreement (BEA), accusing President Bola Ahmed Tinubu of politicising the policy.
The group also faulted the President for failing to address protests calling for the reinstatement of the programme.
The condemnation was contained in a statement issued on Wednesday by Murtala Abubakar, president of the Arewa Defense League (ADL).
Abubakar said the crisis affecting Nigerian students abroad is unfolding quietly but is marked by hardship, humiliation, and unmet commitments.
He maintained that there is nothing fundamentally wrong with the BEA Scholarship Programme, stressing that investment in education cannot be considered wasteful.
“Yes, the program has always struggled with delays and bureaucratic cruelty. But never before has a Nigerian government so casually turned its back on students already in the field, already committed, and already vulnerable.
“A nation may abandon roads and refineries, but when it abandons its children, especially in foreign lands, it abandons its soul.
“It began when the Bola Tinubu administration abruptly scrapped the Bilateral Education Agreement (BEA) Scholarship Programme, a lifeline that had enabled thousands of brilliant but underprivileged Nigerians to enter classrooms across China, Russia, Morocco, Hungary, and beyond.
“President Tinubu has remained silent, playing politics with everything. Not a word on the protests. Neither on hunger. Not a word on the moral collapse of a program built on diplomacy and mutual respect. This silence is perhaps the loudest indictment of all,” he said.
Bellnews recalls that in May 2025, the Minister of Education, Dr Tunji Alausa, announced that the Federal Government would discontinue funding for foreign scholarship programmes.