Tujoromajo Kasuto
Namibia Students Financial Assistance Fund (NSFAF) Acting Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Kennedy Kandume, says the fund has 8000 debtors that are economically active, as they are earning an income through various means and combined, they owe the fund N$4.2 billion.
Kandume further condemns those “sitting comfortably in their offices, while there are needy students struggling with registration at various institutions of higher learning and calls them “selfish”.He further announces that there has been a significant improvement in terms of the amount recovered, following the launch of the recovery campaign last year noting about 2832 debtors came forward to make arrangements and sign acknowledgements of debt.
However, he reveals that the Fund has noticed with concern that debtors are only contacting it to avoid their names to be published pretending their intention to pay while in actual fact the motive is to not get published once they contact the Fund.
Consequently, Kandume affirms that he they will face litigation as they are deliberate in their actions and are “not patriotic Namibians who want to see others succeed as they are selfish”.
“We are aware that they are employed and have assets, earning income and thus we are left with no choice but to take this people through the litigation process as they have been handed over to the legal department and it is just a matter of time until their get served to head to court.,” he says.
In addition, NSFAF is hoping to have the debtor’s asset’s attached, if they are adamant to not pay as this is a “debt like any other dept and must be repaid.”
The Acting CEO says the recovery strategy is still the same and they will go ahead with the publishing of the names of the debtors, however he says they are only going to publish the names of those they cannot get a hold of.
Meanwhile, NSFAF also announced they will no longer fund for Aviation and Pilot training for the next three years as they have to redirect funds to continuing students who have had to dropout due to the inadequacy of the funding they have received annually.
Kandume explains that the Fund provides N$ 67 000 for Aviation students and over the past years, most dropped out as the amount only covered for about only the first two months of training.Thus, this will ensure that those who were funded before are funded adequately and this is expected to benefit 82 continuing trainees.
According to Kandume the decision stems from a training revision which the Fund took last year with the Aviation regulators.
Going forward, NSFAF will assess what is needed in the Aviation industry and will hopefully replicate this to other industries to make an assessment as he laments that there are industries that are getting funding without an assessment of what impact they make and if whether they are still relevant.
This was all revealed at a Press Conference and 2022 Online Application Launch held today by the Fund.
The application process commenced today and closes at the end of March 2022, which gives amble time to all potential applicants to have enough time to apply. Kandume informs that the application form is online as all information on the application process.
Thus potential applicants are not advised to visit the Fund’s offices.
