R4bn owed to Universities in fees amid threat of renewed student protests
04 December 2015
At a meeting of the Higher Education and Training Portfolio Committee, together with student leaders and other stakeholders, the Department of Higher Education and Training yesterday acknowledged that Universities are owed an estimated R4 billion in unpaid fees and residence expenses. This is on top of the R2.3 billion shortfall created by the fees increase moratorium announced for next year, and the total of R5 billion in unrecovered NSFAS loans for 2015 alone.
These astronomical figures speak to the chronic underfunding of the higher education system and NSFAS. As Universities are forced to increase fees in the light of shrinking government subsidies, they are placing a greater burden on students who are simply not able to afford it.
NSFAS is already only able to fund roughly half of the students who qualify for funding. This excludes those from the so-called “missing middle” – students who are too “well-off” to qualify for NSFAS loans, but who are nevertheless from underprivileged backgrounds.
These are the students that have been left behind, unable to pay for their studies, while President Zuma’s administration wastes billions on unnecessary luxury expenses, such as the planned R4 billion jet he is yet to denounce.
SRC Presidents and other student representatives told Parliament yesterday that they were extremely concerned about the high likelihood that widespread student protests will flare up again as soon as Universities open next year. This is a direct result of the failure of Zuma government to address the crisis with a plausible long-term plan rather than a series of short term fixes.
The student leaders went on to say that the high levels of student debt, leading to the inability of thousands of students to register, would be the most likely trigger for these protests.
Minister Nzimande and the Presidential task team need to address the problem of student debt, particularly debt to Universities, urgently. The DA is seriously concerned that government inaction in this crisis could destabilise the entire education system in the New Year, and contribute to the progressive instability of the country as a whole.
The ANC government should make significant changes to spending patterns in next year’s budget – something which government has been unwilling to make in the recent mid-term budget, opting instead to maintain and expand the luxuries that the President and his Cabinet have become accustomed to.
The DA will continue to push for an immediate and long term solution to this problem, which is in fact the result of long-standing, intractable problems of which the government has been aware for years.
The DA will use every effort to ensure that universities receive sufficient funding to prevent a total collapse of the sector and create the opportunities that students rightly deserve.
Statement issued by Prof Belinda Bozzoli MP, DA Shadow Minister of Higher Education and Training, 4 December 2015
