DA to oppose Higher Education Bill adopted by Committee

11 May 2016

The Portfolio Committee on Higher Education and Training today adopted the Higher Education Amendment Bill. It will be considered in Parliament in two weeks and the DA will oppose the Bill because, amongst other things, it gives too much power to the Minister and in so doing threatens university autonomy. 

The Bill is ostensibly simply put forward to streamline and update the legislation covering universities. But in fact it is replete with provisions expanding the powers of the Minister of Higher Education and further eroding the already severely weakened principle of university autonomy. Universities soon will be unable to fulfil their obligations towards the Constitutional principle of academic freedom as the state intervenes relentlessly into their domain.  

The Bill will expand the Minister’s powers to issue binding directives to universities and to put universities under administration. It will provide the Minister with unprecedented powers to force universities to offer TVET courses, even if they are not equipped to do so. In some clauses, the Minister is simply given a blank cheque to intervene at will. ANC MPs in Committee claimed it was “unwise” the limit the Minister’s powers.

New wording will make it more difficult for Ministerial decisions to intervene in Universities to be challenged in court, even if they were based upon incorrect information. In fact the terminology used in the Bill is similar to that used in colonial and Apartheid era security legislation, when governments wanted to prevent courts from overturning certain decisions, such as the arrests of political activists. 

When the drafters of the Bill gave testimony to the Committee they supported the fact that the Minister would no longer have to definitively prove that he was entitled to intervene. 

The DA objected to these and other provisions. We proposed amendments, some of which were accepted, to various clauses. One such amendment removed an extraordinary clause which would empower the Minister to clear the record of council members who had been implicated in corrupt or other irregular activities at universities, and to allow them to serve on a council again. 

Another was our successful modification of the clause concerning transformation which should be done through policy and not legislation- as is normal in this sector. It is important to note that the DA is in full support of creating diversity in our Universities. 

However, the Committee became increasingly protective of the Minister’s powers as deliberations progressed. On one occasion, a DA amendment was immediately blocked by the Committee, but when a similar amendment was approved by representatives from the Department of Higher Education the Committee’s ANC members quickly got into line and accepted the amendment. It seems, as such, that the Minister has captured the Committee, just as he hopes to capture universities. 

As a whole the Bill will not make a significant contribution towards solving the chronic problems in the University sector and to this end the DA cannot be party to the Minister’s quest to increase his powers. The Bill should be of concern to us all. 

Issued by Belinda Bozzoli, DA Shadow Minister of Higher Education and Training, 11 May 2016