Strike to continue until Wits meets our demands — students

Wits University students have vowed to continue with their protests over financial exclusion, historical debt and lack of funding.

“This institution will be ungovernable up until students are able to register, up until the university absorbs the balance. We will not stop up until these demands are met,” shouted student representative council president Aphiwe Mnyamana as he addressed protesters at the main campus in Braamfontein, Johannesburg.

Students yesterday disrupted classes and blocked various entrances to the university.

A group of students was seen chanting and calling on other students to join them, while reinforced security personnel followed them around.

Mnyamana said they had been negotiating with the university over denial to register students with outstanding debt.

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He said the council had asked the university to allow students with less than R150,000 debt to register and for the university to absorb the rest of the funds needed for student accommodation since the National Student Financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS) has capped the accommodation fees at R45,000.

He said the university declined, leading to the protest.

“At the beginning of the year, we wrote a memorandum of concession because every year we know there is an issue of student registration. Students with historical debt are not able to register because the institution says you must owe less than R10,000 or you must pay 50% of your debt [before registration].

“Students do not have money and some lost bursaries during the pandemic, so students with less than R150,000 debt must be allowed to register. NSFAS, which previously had no cap to the funding for accommodation, has now capped their funding at R45,000. Accommodation charges go up to roughly R80,000, including food, per year at Wits. The R45,000 does not even cover the minimum accommodation fees without food because the cheapest residential is R56,000 at Wits,” said Mnyamana.

A law student owing R210,000 said it was unfair for an LLB degree to be considered as a postgraduate degree because to practice law one has to have an LLB.

“I have a BA degree in politics but I can’t find a job, my chances of having a job are much higher with a law degree. I have a single mother with five siblings, there is nothing that she can do for me. Must we be reduced to R350 grant?”

Another student owing R124,000 and has not been able to register said he is squatting at student residential because of unpaid fees.

“We are here to better ourselves, to get skills so that we can go out there and compete but the system is not allowing us to do that. I am squatting because being here gives me hope that I will continue with my studies.”

The university yesterday said it was “committed to enabling students to access higher education, as far as its resources allow. The university has progressively increased the amount of funding allocated to students”.

“In 2022, Wits disbursed over R1.6bn to 26,161 students. Students are being assisted on a daily basis as beds become available. The university and private service providers are also navigating NSFAS’s decision to cap accommodation costs at R45,000 per annum, which is regrettable.

“Wits appealed the decision and lobbied for a differentiated approach that takes the real cost of accommodation into account,” it said in a statement.

NSFAS spokesperson Kagisho Mamabolo had not responded to Sowetan's questions at the time of going to print.

mbelet@sowetan.co.za