NSFAS board ‘unable to carry out basic duties’

Higher education minister Blade Nzimande says he was left with little choice but to dissolve the National Student Financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS) board last week after it ignored his request to remove incompetent service providers.

He said the incompetence was the main cause of mass delays in paying student fees to tertiary institutions in SA.

“As minister I have continually raised my concerns of [the] NSFAS board being unable to carry out basic duties,” Nzimande said at a press briefing on Sunday. “I asked that service providers that were appointed irregularly be removed in December. They have caused unnecessary stress of students and parents,” he said, adding that the request was ignored.

He said the NSFAS board also failed to submit a financial report to parliament. “The call centre is still not functioning. NSFAS do not respond to queries in a timely manner. In the end I had little choice. There is serious reputational damage to NSFAS, the department of higher education and government,” he said.

The minister dissolved the NSFAS board on Thursday last week. Chair Ernest Khosa resigned on Thursday before Nzimande announced his decision to dissolve the board.

Khosa and Nzimande have been linked to allegedly irregular tenders NSFAS issued to four service providers to manage payments to beneficiaries. Both have denied the allegations.

NSFAS provides financial support to about 1.1-million students at universities and technical and vocational education colleges.

In 2022, it appointed four service providers Coinvest Africa, Tenet Technology, Ezaga Holdings and Norraco Corporation to make direct payments to NSFAS beneficiaries.

Its payment systems were subsequently racked with problems, leaving thousands of students without the means to pay for food or accommodation.

DISCIPLINARY COMMITTEES

On Sunday, Nzimande said forensic investigations were close to completion and promised there would be accountability. “Yes, people will account. One of the things we want the administrator to do is to implement the recommendations of forensic auditors. I want the people fingered to be brought before disciplinary committees as soon as possible.”

Calls by opposition parties for him to resign over the fiasco were nothing but “politicking” and they added “nothing constructive”. He also said there was “no going back” to a situation in which universities administered student aid on behalf of the financial aid scheme.

“NSFAS gets given money by the department and has to account. If it’s given to a university and the university messes up, how can there be accountability? This was a new studentcentred model, which would allow NSFAS to take direct responsibility ... NSFAS has been a massively successful tool to transform SA. We don’t intend to change that.”