Durban students protest housing crisis

Students protesting at the gates of eThekwini TVET College’s Centec campus in Morningside on Monday, demand an urgent solution to their accommodation crisis. Photo: Tsoanelo Sefoloko / GroundUp

Students at Thekwini TVET College’s Centec campus in Morningside have been protesting outside the Centec campus in Morningside for days, demanding an urgent solution to their accommodation crisis.

GroundUp spoke to dozens of students on Monday and Tuesday who are refusing to return to lectures until management responds to their demands.

“I will protest until they listen to our demand because most of us here come from financial disadvantaged families where we are really relying on the government social grant,” says Siphesihle Cele, a second-year student. “I was shocked to hear that I’m not going to be funded this year without any good reason.”

He is among hundreds of students who have not been able to register to pay for student residences due to delays or queries over National Student Financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS) funding.

Dineo Mofokeng, a first-year financial management student, said she relied on her grandmother’s old age grant while completing grade 12. She was hoping to apply for NSFAS funding. “I have nowhere to go if the college doesn’t want me to be here. I sometimes feel like I could just go back home but because I want to study, I have made sure that I stay.”

“The living conditions at our residence are unbearable, but I will stay until the school management finds an amicable solution,” said Mofokeng.

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Other students complained that their landlords are threatening to evict them because NSFAS has not paid them yet. Some claimed they were forced to leave their residences last month and had to get help at a nearby informal settlement.

On Monday college principal Nkosinathi Mchunu told the protesting students to return to classes while management tries to resolve the matter. Asked about the students’ claims, Mchunu referred our question to the college’s main office which has yet to respond.

Higher education department spokesperson Lucky Masuku acknowledged that there has been a misunderstanding with regard to student funding.

He said the college needs to finalise the list of names to be sent to NSFAS for funding this year.

This article was originally published on GroundUp.

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