Massive TVET transfer to DHET needs more time

5 March 2015

I will write to the Minister of Higher Education and Training, Dr Blade Nzimande, urging him to consider a postponement of the transfer of the Technical and Vocational Training Colleges (TVET) to the Department of Higher Education and Training (DHET). The deadline is currently 1 April 2015, which is set to negatively affect students by creating massive disruption to the curriculum currently underway.

A total of 38 000 staff working in TVET Colleges and millions of rands worth of assets, ranging from buildings to laboratories and office equipment, as well as all the budgets of the 51 TVETs (formerly known as FET Colleges), are set to officially move from the jurisdiction of the 9 Provinces to the DHET.

In this week's parliamentary Portfolio Committee briefing on the subject it became clear that the move is set to encounter multiple legal, financial and labour relations difficulties as soon as the official transfer date is reached.

The complexities are considerable:

The entire operation has been planned and developed on a shoestring budget, with the Department having been given a fraction of what it requested for the transfer to be undertaken;

Several provinces have only reluctantly signed the official "protocols" of the transfer;

80% of the Annexures to the Protocols remain unsigned. Provinces say they were only sent the outstanding Annexures in December, making it almost impossible for them to check and sign them in time. In many cases, no agreed lists of assets and staff have been prepared;

The Department has in response made unilateral proposals to provinces as to the staff and asset registers, and is expecting provinces to confirm these lists or modify them. This could mean, firstly, that a long period of wrangling over the lists will develop after 1 April and, secondly, uncertainty on the content of the lists could open the way for fraud at the moment of transfer;

In the preparations for the move no fewer than 400 disciplinary cases were mounted by the Department against individual staff who had committed various offences, including wide ranging fraud and corruption. But these stalled amidst claims by accused staff that the DHET did not yet have jurisdiction over them. These cases will now have to be revived as soon as the move is complete; and

Several provinces appear to have "ghost staff" on their books - in the words of Gwebs Qonde, the DG of the Department, these are "people who are located elsewhere but are paid for by the Colleges". This will have to be dealt with urgently.

These and other weaknesses in the process are not likely to be resolved quickly. Not only will this involve the underfunded and understaffed Department in ever more protracted negotiations with each province, it is almost certainly set to adversely affect the lives and experiences of students and staff in the Colleges. This is likely to lead to an increase in the already worrying level of student dissatisfaction and protest action. 

Statement issued by Prof Belinda Bozzoli MP, DA Shadow Minister of Higher Education, March 5 2015

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