Nzimande: Department will assist Unisa to get house in order

Nzimande made the remarks at an event on Monday to mark the institution’s 150 years of existence.

"Unisa itself faces the challenge of renewing itself at 150 years of its existence,” Nzimande said.

“I must address this because I want to also say to the media, please, for today and tomorrow, just cover Unisa for its 150 years, then later we can chat about the challenges facing Unisa."

Over the weekend, the Sunday Times published a story revealing some of the challenges faced by the institution’s students.

According to the publication, close to 400 000 out of 920 000 student assignments submitted to the institution were not marked in the first semester.

Issues of governance also continue to plague the university, including claims of maladministration and tender corruption.

Nzimande said the issues will not be swept under the carpet.

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“I want to say as someone assigned the task of being minister in this respect, we are seeking to address the challenges that are facing Unisa. Not because we want to run Unisa down, it's because the governance challenges it is facing are the issue of its operating model. We want to address those so that it continues to play the role it is supposed to play in South Africa."

At the same time the university’s chancellor, former president Thabo Mbeki, warned against the decline of the institution.

"In this context,  I hope that many of us have read the relatively short article on Unisa by one of our leaders that  I greatly respect, Dr Mosibudi Mangena, former president of Azapo and former minister of science and technology.

“He said: ‘Some of us were alarmed and saddened by stories circulating in various media outlets in recent weeks about alleged wrongdoings at the Unisa’ and he said: ‘Every patriotic South African should be worried about the apparent decline in the prestige of Unisa. But a collapse should induce earthquakes in our heads’”.