SIU: R5bn in NSFAS allocations to non-qualifying students

The SIU presented its findings in Parliament on Tuesday.

The non-qualifying students were students whose household income was above R350 000.

“These students did not submit their parent's details upon application and therefore the means test was not properly conducted,” said SIU spokesperson Kaizer Kganyago.

“Furthermore, the SIU has facilitated a refund or managed to ring fence approximately R38,3 million possibly due to NSFAS from three TVET colleges.

“Two of this colleges are in the Western Cape and one from Mpumalanga, the SIU is in the process of engaging other institutions to determine if there are holding any overpayments that need to be ring fenced pending the finalisation of the investigation.”

Kganyago added their investigation shows that NSFAS failed to design and implement controls that would ensure that there is an annual reconciliation between the funds disbursed to the institutions and the funded list of registered students.

“This control weakness led to overpayments and underpayments of funds to the different institutions for the period 2017 to date. To remedy this, NSFAS has recently appointed a service provider to assist them perform this reconciliation in a process called ‘close out reporting’.

“The SIU has also identified different scenarios in terms of which students were funded because of over payments, underpayments, unfunded students, double dipping and dropouts, and the involvement of syndicates in student accommodation.”

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