By Takudzwa Changadeya
A call has been made by the Zimbabwe National Students Union (ZINASU) to the government to re-establish student grants to make education affordable in the current harsh economic situation.
Potential students from underprivileged families are finding it difficult to enrol in tertiary institutions due to financial constraints, ZINASU said.
In a circular, ZINASU demanded student grants saying: “Thousands of potential graduates do not make it to University or College because they come from financially disadvantaged families.”
“On 23 August let’s #GoVote for the return of student grants,” the circular added.
In January 2011, Zimbabwe suspended the student grants scheme as a result of political bickering, as parliamentarians pushed for the abolition of President Robert Mugabe’s controversial scholarship fund.
They were opposing the scholarship funding arguing that it would support a privileged few to study abroad.
In December 2011, the then Finance Minister Tendai Biti announced that student grants were part of the 2011 unity government’s budget.
The re-establishment of the student grants was nearly a decade after being shelved as a result of economic deterioration that saw world-record inflation at one stage reaching 1.3 million per cent in Zimbabwe.
However, appearing before the parliamentary portfolio committee on education, the then Higher Education Secretary Washington Mbizvo said he regretted that Biti had announced the students grant programme before undertaking necessary consultations, therefore it wasn’t successful.
