The National Student Financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS) has removed 5 000 students from its list of beneficiaries.

Higher Education, Science and Innovation Minister Dr Blade Nzimande on August 26 said the 5 000 students were provided with funding support, but had provided inaccurate information for the 2020 academic year.

“This decision by NSFAS was due to recent financial information obtained from the South African Revenue Services (Sars) which revealed that there were discrepancies on the total household income declared by the students and verified household income as per Sars data,” he pointed out. 

He elaborated that the data from Sars had shown that these students came from families who had household income that exceeded the maximum threshold for qualifying for financial support from the NSFAS.

“NSFAS has issued communique to all affected students notifying them of termination of their funding status, and the process to follow if they dispute the findings.

“The affected students will have 14 days from the date they received the SMS communication to petition this decision by submitting proof of family income or change of income to NSFAS for review," the Minister added.

Nzimande said corruption could not be tolerated irrespective of who commits it and that legal action would be taken where there were proven cases of fraud.

“At this point, we must raise the strongest concern and objection to any students who have deliberately submitted false information to ‘game’ or con the system; this is clearly a case of unethical and corrupt behaviour.” 

“Legal action will be taken against these culprits and NSFAS will recoup funds from students who were attempting to defraud the scheme by misrepresenting their financial status,” he said.

Meanwhile, the Minister also noted that the NSFAS would appoint a contractor to supply digital learning devices for NSFAS-funded students currently registered at universities and technical and vocational education and training colleges. 

He said the provision of the devices was of extreme urgency as part of the government’s response to Covid-19.

“These learning devices are meant to assist students in completing their 2020 academic year. Trimester 1 and Semester 1 students who will be enrolling for Trimester 2 and Semester 2 will qualify to receive the devices.”