20/01/2025
[01/20, 21:56] Kutullo Bazala: https://www.facebook.com/share/19uqrpb5Fy/?mibextid=wwXIfr
[01/20, 21:56] Kutullo Bazala: For immediate release
20 September 2025
STATEMENT OF THE SPECIAL NEC MEETING
The South African Technical Vocational Education and Training Student Association held its first special NEC meeting, which received reports from provinces on the ongoing registration processes that are currently taking place in the TVET Sector. The NEC would like to applaud the work that is being done by our SRC members in assisting students on their first day of the academic year.
The NEC received reports on many issues that are currently taking place at our campuses from PECs, SRC, and students. Below are some of the issues but not limited:
DHET ISSUES
1. DIPLOMA
We have been informed that the majority of our students’ diploma applications were rejected in the year 2024 for the same reason, which is wrong placement. This raises many questions as institutions have been placing students at the same workplaces or companies for years, and students were receiving their diplomas without any problems of wrong placement but for some strange reason, this has been the main reason for rejecting Diploma applications. The Examination and Assessment unit of the department seems not to care that students spent 18 months at these companies and they must re-do the whole process from scratch.
2. PENDING RESULTS
In October 2024, the association forewarned both the Department and Portfolio Committee on Higher Education and Training about the chaos that was happening with the 2024 final examinations.
Some of the matters raised by the were the following but not limited.
• Wrong or incorrect question papers were written.
• No material or login information for online papers and some refused to open.
• Question papers transported in vans without canopies, which might have led to many question papers being leaked
As we predicted, today we have a lot of results that are pending because of some of the above irregularities. We have heard from our SRCs that some of those wrong question papers will be rewritten as supplementary exams.
The implications of these treasonous acts by officials at the Examination and Assessment unit of the Department will lead to some of the following problems:
• NSFAS will take time to make funding decisions on returning students.
• Landlords will chase those students out of their accommodations
• The image of the TVET Diploma will be severely compromised
The whole TVET sector is dependent on the quality of its examination process, the Association would get a briefing from the chief director of the examination and assessment unit at the Department pre and post-final assessments, however, in 2024, this did not happen. The 2024 final assessments have been nothing but shambolic, if not a deliberate attempt to sabotage not the DDG responsible or the Minister.
NSFAS ISSUES
The association has been working closely with NSFAS on trying to fix issues that are affecting our students on the ground. However, we have observed a disturbing pattern of NSFAS not keeping the majority of their promises, and we have concluded that NSFAS deliberately undermines both the students of the TVET Sector and colleges as a whole. Unfortunately for them, as the association we will not allow such. Some of the wrong tendencies that we have observed at the start of the 2025 academic year from NSFAS are as follows;
1. STUDENTS’ ACCOMMODATION
Together with SRC members and college officials, we have been engaging with the administrator of NSFAS and his accommodation unit at NSFAS on the best possible way of implementing the private accommodation system at our colleges without causing chaos, similar to the reckless processes of last year.
A meeting was held in December 2024 to agree on the best solution for TVET colleges and subsequently, another meeting was held in January between college officials and NSFAS and reaffirmed the same agreement of December 2024, how we have learned that NSFAS is disregarding all those agreements and continues to make landlords allocate for themselves and also students do the same, without any car of how chaotic that process is. Colleges don’t even know where the students stay and they don’t even know whether those places were correctly accredited or they will be the same prostitution houses, where our students were made to stay last year by the same NSFAS. Student Representatives Council is not even involved in the whole process. We have concluded that the Accommodation unit of NSFAS is deliberately trying to cause protests at our institution. It seems like direct and coordinated sabotage, they did not even attend the meeting we organized between NSFAS and all college SRCs in December 2024, just to show how little they take the TVET sector. Something urgently needs to be done here before the whole sector is thrown into chaos.
2. OUTSTANDING ALLOWANCES
In December 2024, college SRC members raised issues of non-payment allowances for 2024 in a meeting with NSFAS, and it was agreed that there would be a payment that would take place in December, which will be a mop-up payment and this has not been done
3. APPEALS
After we raised the issue of not recognizing the appeals committee by Nsfas robustly. The committee set its first meeting on October 2024, where NSFAS was trying to force the committee to close rejected appeals without verification. However, the committee refused and did the monitoring, which they found out that the majority of students were unfairly rejected by the system and case workers, however, the remedial proposals from the committee were ignored by NSFAS, and continued to reject those students and this is not just undermining of both SATVETSA and SAUS but it’s a direct undermining of the Minister as this committee was established by the Minister.
4. NSFAS GUIDELINES
The association has been pleading with NSFAS to standardize allowances of students from both universities and TVET colleges, which will mean an increase in allowances for the TVET Sector students. We have explained ourselves many times as to why we should be treated equally. However, NSFAS continues to undermine us as a sector. The price of bread does not know the difference between a university student and a TVET student but for some strange reason, NSFAS seems to be the only ones who know this. They have concluded themselves that Spar, Shoprite, etc can tell the difference between a student from TVET and a university student and then proceed to charge them differently!!
The association will be meeting the minister, Honourable Dr. Nobuhle Nkabane, on 23 January 2025.
The NEC and its delegates to the meeting will raise the above issues and many others faced by the sector with resolutions and recommendations.
After the meeting, the structure will consult SRC members, PEC members, and all other stakeholders on the way forward but the deliberate sabotage and undermining of the sector will not continue unchallenged, if all fails, the streets will be our only hope!
IN CONCLUSION
SATVETSA would like to thank the minister of Higher Education and Training for approving the delegation of the association and DHET to attend a conference of the progressive world youth in Venezuela. However, the Association was left with a bitter taste at how the Director General of DHET deliberately undermined the structure and the sector, firstly by delaying the approval of the trip and secondly by being dishonest and claiming to not know anything about it whilst he had our submission in December. This made us, note that, not even once the DG ever called us into a meeting to discuss strategic issues of the department or sector nor did we know his plans on any matter that is TVET related. We only see him following the Minister around and at times we mistake him for a chief of staff. His actions proved to us as an association that the department is undermining the TVET sector and if this continues will be forced to call for a national shutdown!
Lastly, the Association had very successful engagements in Venezuela around TVET student exchange and leadership development programs. We will continue to engage with the Embassy of Venezuela in South Africa and SAPCO in terms of implementing the progressive resolutions that were agreed upon.
Issued by SATVETSA NEC
Kgaogelo Chokoe
National President
[email protected]
Wongani Mhlekazi Mgwali
SATVETSA Secretary General
[email protected]
073 807 7433
For inquiries:
Thabiso Luvuuno
National Spokesperson
[email protected]
065 968 2407
