It is one of the biggest mysteries of our time.At the precise moment that almost half the civil service is studying part-time for the University of Derby’s MSc in Strategic Management, why is there no apparent strategic management around paying student allowances on time by the Department of Tertiary Education Financing? Whatever the answer is, the net result has been that year in and year out, there is a student strike at one government-supported university or the other over the late payment of allowances. The irony of it all is that all too often it is universities, and not DTEF itself, that is on the receiving end of students who express their displeasure violently.
As one of the few African countries that fully fund social-protection programmes out of its own resources, Botswana dedicates a large part of its GDP to a bursaries scheme that is administered by DTEF. The scheme pays for tuition fees, books, equipment, living allowance, warm clothing, medical fees, insurance, and other costs. Tuition and other fees are paid directly to the educational institution while a cash (student) allowance is paid to the student through an arrangement that excludes institutions. The allowance is paid directly into students’ bank accounts by DTEF itself and given how long this arrangement has been in place, the process should now be proceeding like clockwork. It doesn’t and the result is that on an almost semesterly basis, government-sponsored students somewhere (and at the University of Botswana especially) are boycotting classes because their allowances have not been paid on time.
The most recent incident occurred at what has been a relatively quiet institution – the Botswana International University of Science and Technology. In a shocking development, the strike turned violent as riot police unleashed a volley of rubber bullets on the students protesting the non-payment of their allowance. One would expect that in a period of time that “Fourth Industrial Revolution” easily rolls off the tongues of officialdom, it should have been easy to deploy all the technological wonders of the Third Industrial Revolution to ensure that students get their allowances on time. That has not happened and according to government sources, the finger of blame has to point unwaveringly at DTEF.
“The Department never wants to take blame for the late payments but is solely to blame because universities don’t disburse the allowances themselves – it does,” says a source at a government university. “This issue has nothing to do with universities.”With regard to the latter, it is important to note that DTEF releases money only after receiving all the necessary information about students’ performance and registration status. In the past, the Department has attempted to absolve itself of blame by arguing that it disburses allowances on the basis of the feedback it gets from universities. One counter-argument is that DTEF has stymied effort to resolve the problem. An example given in service of the latter is that when some universities, at their own cost, offer to link up the Department to their networks, it refuses.“Such linkage would have given DTEF access to the latest information it requires to process student allowances speedily,” adds the source.
“With such information, it would be able to pay allowances much faster.”Allegations about what DTEF is not doing right seem to have reached students and trouble that it has not been subjected to may have literally reached its own doorstep. Last year, riot police in Gaborone detained some UB students who took the law into their own hands by forcibly locking up the gate at the DTEF offices in Block 6. This incident portends a future in which the mayhem that occurs on the campuses of government-supported universities could be visited upon DTEF itself.Another source says that the fact that late-payment happens at various universities is evidence that the problem has the same source – which he identifies as DTEF.“
Why would finance officers at all these different universities be similarly incompetent and why would all identify DTEF as the source of the problem?” poses the source. “The problem is actually much more extensive than the late payment of student allowances and you need to go beyond it if you want to ascertain where the blame lies. DTEF would have people believe that its processes are thorough but why does it still pay money into deferred student accounts even when it knows about such deferment?”The Department is also being faulted for not doing enough to help the government’s effort to recover money from beneficiaries of a bursaries scheme it administers on the explicit understanding that such money will be paid back. The writer can confirm this particular point on the firm basis of personal experience. Some six years ago, the writer called at the DTEF offices to enquire how he could repay a student loan that he had benefitted from. He was directed to an upper-floor office staffed by two female officers.
One pulled out his file from the archives and calculated a monthly sum that would be paid into the department’s bank account. However, the writer didn’t have one crucial piece of information that the officer required at his fingertips and it was agreed that such detail would be communicated telephonically when he had accessed it at his house. However, when he called the office an hour or so later, nobody picked up the telephone. He called again and again and again and again with the same result for two days until he finally gave up.It turns out that nothing may have happened even if the phone had been answered and the missing information provided. From what Sunday Standard learns, the bank accounts of some beneficiaries who also took the initiative to repay their student loans and provided all the required information, are still are still not being debited.
Ironically, when the issue of repaying student loans is raised, officialdom always stresses the point about “responsible citizenship” when effort to be responsible citizens is continually rebuffed. As a 2015 World Bank report shows, the recovery rate for bursaries is less than 5 percent.
