NSFAF bosses must account, says Nudo

NSFAF bosses must account, says Nudo National Unity Democratic Organisation (Nudo) leader Asser Mbai feels that it is only fair that the executive management of the embattled Namibia Students Financial Assistance Fund give a full account of what has happened to money allocated to the state-owned enterprise before it is reintegrated into the ministry of higher education.

Mbai, who serves on the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Public Accounts, recalled that it had been difficult to get meaningful responses from NSFAF when irregularities came to light.

“We have to investigate and see what happened to the funds, we want the full background, what did they do?” said Mbai of the NSFAF debacle.

“We are not happy,” Mbai said of the developments at NSFAF, before calling it “an absolute mess”.

Academic Andrew Niikondo, on the other hand, said he did not foresee any problems with changing the fund's status.

“I don't think it is a problem for NSFAF to be reintegrated back into the ministry as long as it is managed properly,” said Niikondo.

“The only issue is that of staff members. The NSFAF is comprised of generic functions like finance, human resources, logistics and so forth. When you go back into the ministry, how are you going to fit all these people back into the ministry that are carrying out these functions? What are you going to do with all these people?”

The Namibia National Students Organisation's secretary-general for the Khomas Region, Shoki Kandjimi, believes the reintegration of NSFAF into the ministry of higher education, technology and innovation will result in faster transfer of money to students.

Kandjimi added that he did not believe the change would greatly affect students but said they were still trying to gain clarity.

“It is really not an issue for us although we are generally still trying to understand the issue. Overall I think this will be a good thing.”

Kandjimi said NSFAF's wage bill would also shrink, leaving more money for students.

NSFAF's payment of tuition fees to institutions of higher learning was often bogged down because of administrative red tape.

“We expect the process to be much faster. Since treasury allocations had to go to the ministry before being allocated to NSFAF, we believe the process will be sped up. It will fast-track funding to students,” Kandjimi said.

At the State House year-end media briefing in December, higher education minister Itah Kandjii-Murangi said although the institution had yielded some benefits, its existence had become questionable.

“The negative publicity in the last few months called for introspection on how we needed to function better and it eventually came out that it is better to revert to the ministry,” she said.

NSFAF was established in January 1997 to provide financial assistance to students at approved institutions of higher education.