12,000 TVET college students wait for meal allowances since January

About 12, 000 students from TVET colleges across the country have not received their meal allowances since January, allegedly due to the registration of a new programme offered at the colleges.

According to the National Student Financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS), the students affected are doing an occupational and non-occupational programme.

NSFAS spokesperson Ishmael Mnisi said the new programme has brought challenges in aligning data.

“The complexity of the new programme registration has contributed to challenges in aligning data, which has impacted timely disbursement."

According to Mnisi, the NSFAS has shared the affected records with the college, and a team of data specialists and senior managers are working to resolve the issues.

“Occupational programmes introduced in 2025 were included in NSFAS’s funding framework and budget process. However, the accurate disbursement of allowances depends on the integrity of registration data submitted by institutions.”

At Tshwane TVET College, students said they have to decide whether to buy toiletries or food with the money they receive from their parents

About 450 students at the college have been affected, with many saying they can no longer attend lectures due to a lack of basic nutrition and essentials needed for daily student life.

Natasha Mokoena, 22, who is among the 450, said they are not given any information on what will happen next.

“I don’t know what is going on, and I don’t understand what has happened or changed,” she said.

“Last year, we were getting our allowances [R1,700] every month with no problem, but we were expecting funds in March and we didn’t get anything.

”All the college tells us is that it is because of the programme, and no other students from the college who aren’t in the programme are affected,” she said.

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Mokoena said such circumstances makes it difficult for them to attend classes.

“We don’t have the basics. I am living on instant porridge, and that finished on Monday. I don’t know what I am going to eat, and my toiletries are also finishing. There is no update. My mom sent me R400, but that is finished. My roommate tries to help, but she has a budget of her own,” she said.

Student Jessica Matsheba, 23, said her parents don’t have enough money to send her funds.

“How are we supposed to focus in classes with no nutrients and not having washed? It’s not fair, and some parents can barely help. We rely on NSFAS, as parents don’t have money.

“We are doing practicals, and those require a lot of attention and stamina because we enter at 8am and leave at 4pm. We can’t necessarily miss them, and we won’t pass well without food,” she said.

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Parliament’s higher education committee chairperson Tebogo Letsie said there is no excuse for the NSFAS and the institution to keep students waiting for so long.

“Every day they don’t get the funds is a day too long. Some of them might resort to trying to rob people for survival. Females, because they may not have the strength to do so, might resort to lowering their moral fibre,” he said.

Letsie said the NSFAS acting CEO (Waseem Carrim) told him that of the 12,000 affected students, about 7,000 exceeded the N+ rule while around 5,000 were flagged for duplicate registrations from TVET college data.

The N+ Rule is a limit on how long a student can be funded, calculated as the minimum years required for the qualification plus one additional year (or two for students with disabilities) to account for academic delays.

“The NSFAS and said they gave the colleges time to clean the data and submit it.

“Once they receive the cleaned data, they will run a special disbursement to give the students their allowances,” he said.

“But this is from January and it is April and going into May. They could have finalised this on time if they wanted to do so.”