Penniless Unisa students still starving as NSFAS updates its paperwork

Tens of thousands of Unisa students are still waiting to receive their R290 monthly living allowance which should have been paid at the start of the academic year in February.

Unisa informed students in an advisory titled, “NSFAS disbursement delay”, on Wednesday night that the private company responsible for making payments, IntelliMali, had confirmed that they had loaded the disbursements of about 65,000 of the 117, 000 students that Unisa sent through.

“They will increase the number of students to be paid from 20,000 per day to 25,000 as from Thursday. This means that the disbursements for qualifying returning students will be concluded by May 21.”

Unisa, which apologised to students for the inconvenience caused, said that new students should receive their allowances by May 26.

In a previous statement to Sunday Times Daily last Friday, Unisa’s spokesperson, Victor Dlamini, confirmed that the living allowance for 63, 372 of the 91,966 qualifying students, which has been backdated to February, was being released.

Dlamini said payments to a total of 117,913 of the 175,778 students who qualify for the one-off learning material allowance of R5,200 started last Thursday “in batches of 15,000 students per day”.

But frustrated beneficiaries said they had not been paid, despite being promised payment would be made between May 12 and 19.

In a recent tweet, vice-chancellor Prof Puleng LenkaBula said: “We don’t want you to struggle at all. Students allowances are being allocated in tranches by IntelliMali for all qualifying students. We hope that qualifying returning [students] will all be allocated the allowance by May 25, according to our vice-principal finance.”

An angry student said: “Help us. NSFAS [National Student Financial Aid Scheme] should start giving us our allowances in our bank accounts not via a third party which is IntelliMali.”

We are living with depression and can’t focus on our studies because we haven’t received our allowances.

She said they had to submit more than 10 assignments before May 24, but did not have the money to buy prescribed textbooks.

“We are living with depression and can’t focus on our studies because we haven’t received our allowances.”

A first-year student said she had lost all hope of studying this year as she did not know when first-years would be paid.

On Twitter, students recently created the #UselessUnisa hashtag to vent their anger and frustration about non-payment of the allowances. 

They shared dozens of heartbreaking tweets about their dire financial situations and battles to complete assignments without data, textbooks and other learning materials.

Among the stories was a post by an Eastern Cape student who wrote: “It’s that time when you haven’t eaten for days and you keep asking neighbours to help you charge your phone so you can do assignments. You go around asking to do people’s laundry and cleaning just for data and to keep up with your assignments and food. Yeninani, life is not easy for some of us. Times are hard and I live in hope that Unisa will give us allowances soon as four days without food is no joke.”

The student, who lives in an informal settlement in Komani, told Sunday Times Daily she was forced to leave Pretoria at the end of last month and move back home because she was penniless.

The second-year law student said: “I was relying heavily on the R290 living allowance and had hoped it would have been paid by now.”

She told how she hadn’t eaten for days, adding: “I drink water, that’s the only thing I do. My grocery cupboard is bare. I console myself by saying I am on a fast just to make things better.”

She had planned to use the allowance to buy groceries and learning materials.

The reason why not all of the qualifying students will be paid [only 63,372 of the 91,966] is that the initial payment received from NSFAS to date is insufficient to cater for all qualifying students.

—  Unisa spokesperson Victor Dlamini

Meanwhile, Dlamini said the reason for backdating the monthly living allowance to February was because funds were only received by NSFAS in mid-April.

“The reason why not all of the qualifying students will be paid [only 63,372 of the 91,966] is that the initial payment received from NSFAS to date is insufficient to cater for all qualifying students.

“As a result, Unisa management opted to prioritise returning students whose data had already been captured by NSFAS. The data of first-time entering students is still being finalised by NSFAS.”

He said students who have not been paid their monthly and learning material allowances would be paid “as soon as additional funds are received from NSFAS”.

Dlamini said Unisa was aware of the says made about the institution on social media.

“Unisa has already addressed many of the issues raised by students and will address any other issues that are of concern to students.”

eNCA reported earlier this week that NSFAS said it was looking into complaints that some students had not received their monthly allowances. 

According to Unisa’s website, its NSFAS-funded students are entitled to both allowances. The learning material allowance is based on the number of modules registered: R600 a module for the first four and a R5,200 one-off amount for five to 10 modules. 

NSFAS did not respond to e-mailed questions, despite it being e-mailed to them last Wednesday.