Students protest against residence conditions
WITS STUDENTS who stay at the Yale Village Residence began protesting yesterday over claims of unfulfilled promises made by the university.
However, the university did not seem to be aware of their grievances.
Students had been moved from their original residences, Parktown Village (PKV) and Esselen, which were officially shut down earlier this year.
They claim that they were moved to more expensive residences, namely Rennie House in Braamfontein and Yale Village on Empire Road.
Sabelo Ngubeni, the Yale Village house committee chairperson, said: “It cannot be that this university is governable, whereas we have issues like these.
“It cannot be that the (ResLife board) comes here to grandstand and say that they do not know our issues.
“The chairman of ARC (All Residence Council) is here, and he knows our issues.
“It cannot be that in this institution that claims prestige, claims to be number one in Africa and in the world, does such things to students” said Ngubeni.
The students’ demands centred on issues such as: Uncapped wifi. Increase in security. A convenient bus schedule that operates hourly from 6am to midnight.
The provision of temporary wifi in the interim, as the company Res Publica promised.
Visiting hours that operate as per University of the Witwatersrand Residence regulations.
The removal of the Res Publica facilities manager. Only Wits University staff should administrate the residence.
Better and more regular cleaning services.
Consistency in the servicing of lifts and laundry machines, as well as other maintenance problems.
The students burnt tyres and cones, blocking the Yale Road North entrance to the university.
“These issues have not been raised with me by the house committee for the last three or four weeks,” said Rob Sharman, the director of campus housing and residence life.
A memorandum of demands was drawn up and was later signed by the dean of students and Sharman.
By 1pm, the crowd had dispersed. THE Basic Education Department is trying to recover more than R1.5 million from volunteers who fraudulently claimed payments of stipends in one of its programmes aimed at reducing adult illiteracy levels.
The department is now considering using the services of the Asset and Forfeiture Unit to recoup the money that was fraudulently obtained by volunteers in the Kha Ri Gude mass literacy programme, who had registered “deceased” pupils to receive extra payments.
In reply to questions by the DA, Basic Education Minister Angie Motshekga said the department had by March recovered R474 737 of the R1.5m fraudulently received by volunteers who were identified in an internal investigation.
“The balance (R1 075 161) will, where possible, be deducted from the affected volunteers when remaining payments are processed,” Motshekga said.
She said the Asset Forfeiture Unit was on the case to recoup the money on instruction from Parliament’s standing committee on public accounts.
“The department engaged the Hawks regarding the matter, who advised that the relevant body which needs to deal with the matter is the Asset and Forfeiture Unit,” Motshekga said.
The fraud in the department was sparked by an audit query by AuditorGeneral Kimi Makwetu, who found the department had fruitless and wasteful expenditure amounting to R44m in the 2015/16 year.
The amount was later revised to R1 549 899 after the department had conducted a probe to ascertain the exact amount.
Motshekga said auditors had raised red flags after stumbling upon fictitious payments made to volunteers in the Kha Ri Gude project.
“The auditors found that there was registration of deceased learners before the start of the campaign resulting in the overpayments of stipends to educators, supervisors, co-ordinators and the projectmanagement company on account of fraudulent claims.”
Motshekga said the alleged fraudulent cases were investigated and it was found that 90 volunteers were involved in the scam.
“Ninety volunteers were found guilty through the departmental internal processes. Ninety volunteers were identified to have been paid a total of R282 297 without any learners,” she said in one set of replies to the questions.
The identified volunteers were removed from the campaign, she said.
It cannot be that this institution that claims to be number one in the world, does such things