Could NSFAS corruption cause another #FeesMustFall in 2024?

It’s been nearly a decade since the historic #FeesMustFall movement shook South Africa. But amid the echoes of protest and another pivotal #elections season, has anything truly improved?

‘… if money leaves point A at the velocity of Sona speech promises, and doesn’t arrive at point B in the circumference of predicted time, solve for X.”

Sound like nonsense?

It makes as much sense as the current state of affairs in South Africa’s higher education sector, but Politically Aweh, South Africa’s sharpest internet news show, is up to the challenge.

In this latest on-point explainer video, Kagiso KG Mogadi and co-host Céline Tshika flex their funny bones on corruption in higher learning, asking whether anything has actually changed since the Fees Must Fall protests a decade ago already.

“I think we are at a precipice… It’s just business as usual until the whole thing implodes.”

This is the stark warning from Sioux McKenna, from the Centre for Higher Education Research at Rhodes University, after a chaotic start for tertiary education in 2024. Her words are echoed on campuses across the country – students from underresourced backgrounds who have already had to overcome huge challenges to get to university, are then met with the pointy end of education corruption and mismanagement, especially of National Student Financial Aid Scheme grants.

“At the start of every new year in South Africa, it’s back to school, back to the season reruns of our problems – it’s like Friday Action Night…” KG has fun comparing real headlines that are not so funny with the cheesy action movies that come around with monotonous regularity on late-night TV.

“Basically, being a student in SA is like competing in The Hunger Games…” Celine completes the movie metaphor – but for students having this experience, it’s no joke.

Ten years after the #FeesMustFall protests rocked campuses across South Africa, the same minister of education who joked “students must fall” has been mired in allegations of corruption, yet remains in his government position.

No wonder students are outraged.

Could it be only a matter of time before another wave of protest action spreads across campuses?

Wherever there is a big reservoir of money meant for public good, you will also find politically connected companies allegedly getting tenders and paying kickbacks.

It’s a shocking fact that vice-chancellors of universities here earn more than many of their counterparts in Europe and New Zealand, when students find themselves sleeping on the street, without food. “How to say you’re South African without saying you’re South African.”

Student activism and uprisings in South Africa have had a profound impact on who we are as a nation, with the violence of 1976 a flashpoint in the struggle against apartheid. They’re an integral part of our historical fabric and our muscle memory as a nation.

At what point does that sacrifice bear fruit? Young people have every right to feel frustrated by the decisions and actions of selfish elders who are literally stealing and trashing their future – and many of them will be casting their first vote this year. Or casting their second, having had five years of things getting worse.

“It’s an election year, which means we are going to hear all kinds of prepared orals… as they campaign for our Xs. I haven’t seen anyone more desperate for an ex since Jada for Tupac.”

But if you follow the money, the solution to solving for X starts to become clear, and as KG puts it: “The government has been marking their own work for way too long.”

Whether it comes from the ballot box, or the streets, things have to shift. Let’s change the movie from The Hunger Games to The Incredibles. DM

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