Listen: Mbeki on government making free higher education a priority #FeesMustFall
With current tensions around Mzantsi campuses on a high around the issue of fees, Political Economic analyst Moeletsi Mbeki feels that the government isn't doing enough to make this a priority.
Tensions at Wits University have reached such a high level that the campus is on lock down, with riot police also brought in to control the situation. All due to a protest organised by the #FeesMustFall Movement.
Well-published social and political commentator Moeletsi Mbeki has meanwhile questioned the extent to which government is committed to addressing the issue of access to higher education across the board: “I did my higher education in the United Kingdom and all of it was funded by the British government with bursaries which I didn’t have to pay back. I never had a loan and all higher education students had access to government funding in the United Kingdom. The reason was that they wanted to increase the number of working class kids going into higher education because the United Kingdom had fallen behind in terms of its education, behind countries like France, Germany and so on. After the Second World War, they made two major decisions and one was free healthcare and they created the National Health Service, because again after the Industrial Revolution, the British people were in very poor health. The bottom line is you have to decide on your priorities: the British government decided they needed a healthy population and a well-educated population. Today the British economy is one of the most thriving economies in Europe and it would not thrive if they did not make that investment.”
Listen: to Mbeki's thoughts on #FeesMustFall and why he thinks there's no racial conflict in South Africa