NUL students are petitioning the premier over the National Manpower Development Secretariat (NMDS)
Pascalinah Kabi
NATIONAL University of Lesotho (NUL) students have given Prime Minister Pakalitha Mosisili 48 hours to ensure that government-sponsored students’ tuition fees were fully paid or risk a student boycott of examinations penciled for May.
The ultimatum will kick in as soon as the students have submitted their petition to Dr Mosisili- something they hope to achieve this morning.
The students are petitioning the premier to address the National Manpower Development Secretariat (NMDS)’s failure to pay the new NUL tuition fees for its sponsored students for the 2016/17 academic year.
This resulted in the NUL management demanding that each student pay the shortfall by the end of May 2017.
The students say the shortfalls range from M900 to M6 500 depending on the faculty a student is studying under.
Following a 7 February 2017 communique from NUL registrar Liteboho Maqalika-Lerotholi notifying students of the secretariat’s decision not to pay the shortfall, the NUL Student Representative Council (SRC) held consultative meetings with government representatives in an effort to get the state to settle the shortfalls.
However, NUL SRC’s Minister of Education, Thabang Rapapa this week told a media conference that all consultative meetings failed to yield positive results, hence the decision to petition the premier.
“We are going to petition the prime minister because all avenues have been exhausted and did not yield desired results,” Mr Rapapa said.
We held meetings with NUL management and government ministers for the Development Planning; Finance and Education ministries who sent us from pillar to post.
“All these ministers are answerable to the Prime Minister and that is why we believe he is the right person to address this matter.”
Mr Rapapa said the petition also raised the plight of 315 students whose allowances had allegedly not been paid by the secretariat since October 2016.
He said that failure to settle the shortfalls would result in students boycotting the end of the academic year examinations in May.
“Senior government officials have made promises to pay the shortfalls. They however, fail to give us a fixed date.
“So we know that this is their strategy to get us to write our final examinations and then summersault afterwards, leaving individual students with no option but to pay the shortfalls,” Mr Rapapa said.
He said that they would not fall into the “trap” as they did in 2012.
“We are ready to go hungry even up to June and July as long as we fight for a good cause and ensure that government pays our shortfalls,” he said.
For his part, NUL SRC secretary general, Thato Ponya warned Dr Mosisili against treating this matter lightly like “he has done in the past.”
“In September 2016 we petitioned the Prime Minister and to date he hasn’t addressed our grievances. This time around he must respond because we have a mechanism to force him to answer us.
“He will be forced to answer. He is supposed to answer us within 48 hours of receiving our petition,” Mr Ponya said.
He said the “mechanism” would be disclosed today “least it be interpreted to mean we are threatening government”.
He said that petitioning the premier was a last resort after last week’s meeting with Development Planning principal secretary, Majakathata Thakhisi-Mokoena where the latter allegedly failed to give them a definite answer when government would pay the shortfalls.
“We are very clear on this one: government must pay the shortfall.
“No single student sponsored by manpower has the money to pay the shortfall,” Mr Ponya said.
He said the petition would also register the concerns of the Institute of Extra-Mural Studies (IEMS) Mass Communication and Adult Education students who were not sponsored by government.
He said refusing to sponsor diploma courses at NUL while sponsoring other institutions’ diploma courses was tantamount to setting “a bad, funny precedence which promotes failure”.
“How do you explain government’s decision to sponsor diploma courses at other higher learning institutions and not sponsor them at NUL? We call it a policy that encourages failure,” he said.
Mr Ponya said the refusal to sponsor post-graduate courses at the university was also an “insult” to NUL knowing that the Basotho students studying abroad for similar courses were being sponsored by the same government.
He said they would also fight for students on teaching practice who had not been paid their allowances since January 2017.
Mr Ponya invited stakeholders from other higher learning institutions, political parties, civil society organisations and trade unions to support their protest march from Setsoto Stadium to the King Moshoeshoe I Monument as they were fighting for present and future generations.
SRC deputy chairperson, Makhoala Thienyane said government’s failure to fully settle the students’ fees compromised Lesotho’s ability to achieve the ambitious 2030 Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 4 on quality education.
The goal seeks to “ensure inclusive and quality education for all and promote lifelong learning.”
“This is negatively affecting us. We are supposed to be in class preparing for the final examinations but instead we are fighting for our education to be financed, something that we shouldn’t be fighting over,” Mr Thienyane said.
“If we continue to operate like this, we risk failing to achieve the SDG on quality education. This is why we are fighting now to ensure that future generations get quality education.”
Meanwhile, the Prime Minister’s press attaché, Motumi Ralejoe said it was unrealistic for the students to give Dr Mosisili a 48 hour ultimatum.
“The students need to understand that this government, led by the honourable Prime Minister Mosisili, prioritises quality education offered in this country. It doesn’t only prioritise it but it bore all fees to enable deserving students to pursue their career dreams,” Mr Ralejoe said.
He said that it was against this background that government was working hard to ensure that this matter was resolved.
He said Development Planning Minister, Semano Sekatle was working hard to ensure that the issue was resolved within a reasonable time.
“However, giving government or the premier a specified timeframe to respond to their grievances is never a good idea.
“Government will receive the students’ petition today, study its contents and get back to the students once it has concrete responses,” he said.
Meanwhile, the police have released a statement confirming the march has been given the green light.
However, Police Spokesperson, Superintendent Clifford Molefe’s press release stated that the march would begin at the race course, not Setsoto Stadium as the students had indicated.