South African Students Congress (SASCO) has called for the cancellation of the National Student Financial Scheme (NSFAS) direct payment system, which was introduced in 2022, involving four companies facilitating the payment of student allowances.
It says the payment of allowances to students should be managed by NSFAS internally without a third party being involved.
Several students in various institutions of Higher Education across the country marched to the High Education and Training Department today, following Minister Blade Nzimande’s dissolution of the NSFAS Board.
SASCO President, Vezinhlanhla Simelane, “We rather take back the system to universities. We want those companies to be removed from NSFAS with immediate effect. Universities must continue to pay allowances. The issues at NSFAS are systematic. We are calling for the current administration that has been appointed and we don’t know how we’re going to perform and stuff like that. But we believe that the more challenges that are happening at NSFAS at a level of management, so we don’t only need to dissolve the part and leave alone the potatoes that are rotated there.”
Meanwhile, OUTA’s Investigations Manager Rudie Heyneke has called for the SIU to expedite their investigation into the former NSFAS Board Chairperson Ernest Khosa.
This after Khosa resigned ahead of the NSFAS board being dissolved.
The organisation has called for the SIU to include the allegations against Khosa in their NSFAS investigation that was a proclamation by President Cyril Ramaphosa in 2022.
Earlier this year, OUTA published a report about recordings of discussions that Khosa had with two individuals on internal NSFAS decisions and actions taken by the NSFAS Board against the former CEO, Andile Nongogo.
Heyneke says Khosa’s resignation seems to be a case of history repeating itself.
“If we look at Mr. Khosa’s history, in 2005 he was the CEO in Mpumalanga. Just before the PwC investigation report was supposed to be released or released, he resigned. There was also findings of maladministration and the alleged corruption in that report. And it looks like Deja vu, you know, this time around there’s a report that should come out and we do believe that it will, if it hasn’t been handed over to the board yet. It should come out very soon because TGR only had 30 days to do this investigation.”
