Instead of continuously funnelling billions on VIP protection for the political elite and failing State-Owned Enterprises, a true government should rather prioritise the universal funding of higher education students.
These were some of the assurances and plans announced by ActionSA president Herman Mashaba yesterday, as he addressed a handful of tertiary students in Johannesburg on issues plaguing the Higher Education sector ahead of Finance Minister, Enoch Godongwana’s Budget Speech on Wednesday.
The party reiterated how they believed that Godongwana’s Speech would once again leave tertiary education behind as an afterthought in the budgetary process, something which Mashaba vowed he would prioritise to ensure access to more South Africans than ever before should he be voted into power.
The ActionSA head said not only was the higher education sector in disarray but, 30 years into the democratic dispensation, as many as 80% of schools were just as dysfunctional, especially as he highlighted the 2021 Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (Pirls) report that children in public schools could not read for meaning.
Mashaba urged tertiary students to assist the party in taking over the government to enable them to make the necessary changes the sector and the country desperately needed.
“They hate clever blacks because clever blacks will never allow them to steal as openly and brazenly as they are now. To be honest with you, the only way I can help you is to help us to be in government in the next coming months so we can usher in a new dispensation,” he pleaded with students.
“We want you to be able to work, build your own houses, and make sure you can bring dignity to you and your whole family. Not only that but for us we are not only going to provide opportunities to the youth, but what about their parents?”
ActionSA provincial chairperson Funzi Ngobeni, who accompanied Mashaba, said hearing stories by parents of how they were spending money to take their children to school and university only for them to sit at home unemployed with qualifications was something that could not be allowed to continue as the norm.
“We must make sure we work extremely hard so that when they complete their degrees jobs are waiting for them. Mashaba did not just start this party, he was the mayor of Johannesburg and made a significant impact in his short time there, we also engaged the people of South Africa and this is what they want but it has to be a collective effort,” he said.
The Star