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An investigation found nearly 170 residents who allegedly defrauded subsidies from the Continuing Education Development Plan, which involved over MOP1 million. Between 2016 and 2019, two staff members attracted residents to apply to the Education and Youth Affairs Bureau for the Continuing Education Development Plan and apply for subsidised courses. The centre reported untrue attendance records and colluded with instructors and students to forge attendance records while the students received cash rebates amounting to half of the subsidies paid or took other courses held by the centre for free.

Three Georgia women and an Alabama man pleaded guilty to conspiring to defraud the US Department of Education’s Federal financial aid programs worth millions of dollars. According to the Justice Department, they admitted enrolling people who were not eligible to attend college and completing financial aid applications using fake students’ names; they also did fake students’ homework and exams and manipulated grade requirements to continue qualifying for Federal financial aid.

The South African Organisation Undoing Tax Abuse (OUTA) has uncovered “multimillion-rand tender corruption” at the National Student Financial Aid Scheme and has handed over all information to the Special Investigating Unit. OUTA said its revelations follow an investigation into corruption and irregular contracts at the Services Sector Education and Training Authority after a successful Promotion of Access to Information application relating to a ZAR170 million (US$9.6 million) tender for a biometric attendance monitoring system.

The Directorate of Vigilance and Anti-Corruption (DVAC) has booked eight persons, including four former employees of the varsity and four private persons for criminal conspiracy, criminal breach of trust, cheating, forgery, and falsification of accounts. While perusing the details of registration and tuition fees of 16,580 students, the DVAC officials found that the serial number of one demand draft was used multiple times against several students.

The Enumeration Committee of the Federal Government of Nigeria’s homegrown feeding programme has uncovered 349 ghost schools in Nasarawa state. The Committee discovered that some officials were pocketing the money meant for school meals. Two officials were suspended and replaced, however, calls to remove Nasarawa state from the programme were rejected in order to avoid punishing the poor children benefiting from the scheme.

The Commission for the Investigation of Abuse of Authority has filed a charge sheet at the Special Court against 11 people for embezzling a huge amount of money from the Council for Technical Education and Vocational Training (CTEVT) to conduct training programmes for teachers. The school administration and CTEVT officials colluded to embezzle state funds by submitting fake bills, including for never conducted trainings.

The Department of Justice reports that two education officials have been sentenced to jail after pleading guilty to fraudulently enrolling people in virtual schools and then claiming money from public funds on their behalf. The districts received payments from the Alabama Education Trust Fund as if the students were attending public schools while the defendants misappropriated state money through direct cash payments and payments to third-party contractors owned by various co-conspirators.

Two employees at the Higher Education Students’ Loans and Grants Board (HESLGB) have been arrested in Lilongwe for allegedly stealing through a private university, MWK335 million (US$326,000) meant for student loans between 2018 and 2019. Failing to pay rent and provide loans to students at the tertiary institutions, the university made a proposal to the board for a donation of MWK10 million (US$9,750). The board instead sent MWK300 million and asked the university to return the additional money to various accounts belonging to employees at the loans board.