The National Student Financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS) is working to address issues facing student accommodation in KwaZulu-Natal, where landlords have not been paid. Angry landlords blocked the entrance to one of the TVET Colleges in Durban over the outstanding payments. Registration has been disrupted at the Mbumbulu TVET College in KwaMakhutha, south of Durban. This
The National Student Financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS) is working to address issues facing student accommodation in KwaZulu-Natal, where landlords have not been paid.
Angry landlords blocked the entrance to one of the TVET Colleges in Durban over the outstanding payments.
Registration has been disrupted at the Mbumbulu TVET College in KwaMakhutha, south of Durban. This is allegedly due to some landlords of student accommodation closing the gates to these properties over NSFAS payment disputes.
“We blockade the school so that we can put pressure on NSFAS. About 80 students have not paid rent from February until November. Some houses have been repossessed. NSFAS is not paying us timeously. We have spoken to NSFAS, and they have committed themselves to make the payment for September to November before the end of this week, if that fails, we will go to NSFAS offices in Cape Town to demand our money,” says a landlord, Thembile Tenza.
Assistant director in the office of the principal at the KZN Coastal TVET college, David Biyela, appealed to the disgruntled landlords to direct their concerns to the NSFAS offices.
“The college has nothing to do with the payments of landlords, the college cannot dictate where the student wants to reside, so it’s the student that decides which residence she or he wants to use, so we find ourselves in this pug mire and we don’t know why. We are not responsible for payments of landlords. Payments will come from NSFAS so the Landlord must directly communicate with NSFAS if they are having some issues.”
According to NSFAS administrator Freeman Nomvalo, they have started processing the outstanding claims.
“For a number of students, the payment is made to the students because the issues of the pilot had not been rolled out to everybody, so not all the landlords are in the system to be paid directly by NSFAS and in some instances we have identified that students have not paid over the money to the landlords. And then there are some cases that Sbongile was referring to yesterday that the Data that is available does not enable immediate payment. It needs to be verified and closely checked so that the payments are made to valid claims,” Nomvalo says.
He says a team is being deployed to KwaZulu-Natal to find a way forward.
“I really think that we ought to meet the landlord where they are. We shouldn’t subject them to an additional cost of having to go to Cape Town. So, we’re going to be in touch with the landlords in relation to how do we come together because not every claim that is submitted is a claim that NSFAS must meet, so we need to sit down with the landlord and make sure that that process is done. We did do it with most of them in December and those ones will be paid within this week, and we will be sending the team down to KwaZulu-Natal. We will work out the timeline will also involve the student leadership because of the nature of the problems that we are facing,” Nomvalo explains.
According to an NSFAS circular issued in December last year, payments to such landlords, who rent out student accommodation will be processed this month.
NSFAS payment system for TVET colleges poses a challenge for landlords:
Original Story by www.sabcnews.com
Leave a Comment
Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked with *