R1.7bn in unspent funds NSFAS recovered from higher education institutions since 2022 - SIU

JOHANNESBURG - The Special Investigating Unit (SIU) says it has recovered R1.7 billion of unspent National Student Financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS) funds from higher education institutions since 2022.

On Friday, the SIU said the University of the Witwatersrand had returned R450 million to it, while the University of Free State returned R438 million.

The unit said NSFAS doesn’t have processes to recoup unspent money allocated to institutions.

SIU spokesperson Kaizer Kganyago said NSFAS was supposed to collect unspent funds from institutions at the end of each academic year through reconciliation.

“The SIU investigation revealed NSFAS failed to design and implement controls that will ensure an annual reconciliation between the funds disbursed to the institutions and the funds' list of registered students. To address this, NSFAS has hired a service provider to assist it with the reconciliation process referred to as the ‘close-out reporting’.”