The money for free higher education, which was announced by President Jacob Zuma on the eve of the ANC's 54th national conference, can be found in the fiscus without robbing a bank or going cap in hand to the IMF or the World Bank for a loan.
Thabo Mbeki's administration established sector education and training authorities when the economy was faced with a shortage of skills and unemployment.
The R8.4-billion allocated to Setas from the revenue fund, which pays for everything they do, including salaries and other operational expenses, added to the R32-billion allocated to higher education in the current financial year, can fund free quality higher education.What needs to be done is to review the Skills Development Act and the various pieces of legislation that established each Seta to merge all the boards into a single lean board responsible for the Setas.
This would reduce the operational costs of each Seta to make more money available to fund free quality higher education.
This amount, combined with the National Student Financial Aid Schemeallocation, is adequate to fund free higher education for the poor and can even accommodate the missing middle to help their children graduate and have a better life.
The guiding principle for reconfigured Setas would then be to fund students studying for qualifications in each sector. For instance, the Agricultural Seta could fund anyone studying agriculture, while the Construction Education and Training Authority could fund students studying towards engineering qualifications.Setas already award bursaries to students from poor families, like the R8-million bursary that the Health and Welfare Seta provides to students studying towards animal health degrees at the Eastern Cape-based Tsolo Agriculture and Rural Development Institute.
That Seta pays for tuition, board and lodging for the 108 students of the college, who also receive a tablet and a R2000 stipend per month.
All Setas provide bursaries to pupils from poor families and this is an indicator that when the bursary scheme is properly managed, Setas can accomplish their mandates better by financing formal education, rather than by funding the informal learnerships they provide for out-of-school youth.
The reconfigured Setas should then also receive funds that are allocated to the technical vocational education and training colleges, as well as national, provincial and local government funds used by human resource development divisions for bursaries to help students obtain qualifications for scarce skills, in order to have solidified and certain funding for free higher education.The last source of funds for free quality higher education is the money we use for the perks given to politicians serving in the National Assembly and provincial legislatures - things like housing, furniture and transport.
The money for each student needs proper allocation so that we can reduce overallocation of funds. Some students use the "change" they get from bursaries and NSFAS to buy pricey phones and expensive clothes.
When funds are allocated by the reconfigured Setas, they will pay for students and help them access textbooks and other academic material. With the fourth industrial revolution, broadband and the internet in particular, universities and colleges should not think of buying printed books but must explore getting soft copies, which will be cheaper than hard copies.
Now that Zuma is nearing the end of his term as South Africa's president, and has left the ANC presidency, this is what he should be exploring to get money to fund free quality higher education so that we make this resolution of the ANC a reality to help children from poor families to get a head start on transforming their lives.But the focus for the provision of free higher education should not just be on funding. It should also be on ensuring that lower education levels, like primary and secondary school, improve their enrolment numbers and reduce dropout numbers so that the higher education level can get a sizable number of students to realise the objective of providing education to the poor.
Also of importance is to reconfigure the curriculum at all levels of education in South Africa because it doesn't help the students and the economy for the government to spend these billions on free quality higher education when they are taught theory and not the practical skills that will empower them to be self-sustaining and help them to get decent jobs that will benefit our country.
The majority of the students should, in the second year of their studies, be linked to development finance institutions for them to access funding to start their own businesses and get contracts from the government and private sector so that they don't add to the high unemployment figures.
For a country that has 27.7% of its citizens unemployed, and 55.5% of its citizens living in poverty, according to data released by StatsSA, rethinking allocation of resources to education and training is a critical leadership responsibility to help the country address its socioeconomic challenges.The private sector, which has millions for bursaries, can contribute to this fund because it also needs an educated and trained workforce.
If we don't do this, the "radical socioeconomic transformation" and "inclusive growth" that we utter at the drop of a hat will not become a reality but will be just like tenders - and end up benefiting people they were not crafted to benefit.
The National Development Plan, which has quantitative targets and not qualitative targets, is blind to this reality and it is time for government planning to be realistic and for politicians and university bosses to make sacrifices so that the children of this country can have a brighter future through education.
∗ Mvusiwekhaya Sicwetsha is an ANC member and public servant writing in his personal capacity..