02 Sep 2013

The Minister of Education and Skills Development, Dr Pelonomi Venson-Moitoi has guaranteed to resolve student welfare issues at the University of Botswana.

Dr Venson-Moitoi met with the university’s Student Representative Council (SRC) members on August 30 in an effort to understand their grievances. The minister told the SRC that she would, after looking at their proposals, give them a written undertaking that she was attending to their grievances.

She also informed them that she had never been afraid to dialogue with them as she always met with all SRCs on some of their grievances.

Dr Venson-Moitoi appealed to the student community to be responsible citizens and leaders of tomorrow, saying this could only happen when they have successfully completed their studies.

“I do not want to hear issues of massive strike and looming class boycotts,” she stressed. Furthermore, she told the SRC that issues of book allowances existed even before she assumed the office.

As such, she advised them to be patient because such issues could not be resolved in a short time as there was also the need to seek advice. Students had complained that the ministry was delaying in responding to their grievances and that they never received any correspondence after they sent proposals to the ministry and the Department of Tertiary Education Financing (DTEF).

In their proposals, students had come up with some modalities of what should be done to resolve their book allowance dispute.
They seek to be given book allowance because of the monopoly of buying books at the only UB bookshop was hurting their purchasing power because the books were very expensive.
They also proposed that students who remain unsponsored should be sponsored as the minister had announced in the last Parliament session where, she said, over 3 000 students will be re-sponsored.
However, DTEF director, Mr Marcos Maedza told the meeting that there were no delays in responding to students’ grievances because the ministry had received proposals on August 23, two weeks after receipt.

Mr Maedza told them that the minister had not received the proposals because they were still at the permanent secretary’s office.

On the issue of sponsorship, Mr Maedza said students had misunderstood the issue of sponsorship because the ministry could only re-sponsor those who were in their final year and those on progression from diploma to degree as well as those who could not complete or failed due to medical problems for the year 2012/13.

He noted that there were requirements for students under the said categories as they should have a satisfactory record of learning and attendance.

Mr Maedza said the 3 644 students eligible for sponsorship were drawn from all tertiary instututions and not only UB.

UB SRC president, Mr Kago Mokotedi said they were worried that government was hostile to dialogue as they have long wanted to engage on issues pertaining to student welfare with the ministry and DTEF but to no avail.

He said the issue of book allowance has been dragging on for years and even when they attempted to meet with the ministry authorities to resolve the matter, they never received any correspondence.

He said the student community was worried that they were threatened whenever they raised their concerns on the matter and other grievances.

“We need a lasting solution regarding the models we suggested to the ministry management about book allowance,” he said.

Mr Mokotedi also said they wanted to control their study loans as they will be expected to pay back back after completion of their studies, part of which were book allowances. ENDS