Saftu calls for Educor nationalisation, while AdvTech pledges support to students

Educor students find themselves in a moment of despair as their institutions, including Damelin College, City Varsity, Icesa City Campus, and Lyceum College, have been deregistered.

The Department of Higher Education highlighted Educor’s failure to submit audited annual statements and comply with regulations.

The South African Federation of Trade Unions (Saftu) and AdvTech have since taken opposing stances on the matter. Saftu has called for the nationalisation of these institutions, while AdvTech has pledged its support to the affected students.

Educor nationalisation

In a statement released on Thursday, Saftu’s General Secretary Zwelinzima Vavi demanded the nationalisation of Educor institutions. He said this stems from the colleges’ blatant disregard for established labour practices in South Africa. These institutions have been accused of violating workers’ rights and subjecting them to incompetent managerial practices.

Saftu proposed that the department take responsibility by nationalising the colleges and permanently absorbing all affected workers and students.

“Saftu demands the department not to dump students who were mid-way in pursuing their studies and the workers who worked at these institutions, from cleaners and security to lecturers and admin staff,” said Vavi.

ALSO READ: Deregistered college ‘did not tell students’

He further said it was benefitting to have the Educor institutions nationalised because public higher education institutions currently lack the capacity to accommodate all matriculants and students seeking further education and training.

“This is in addition to our demand that they build new colleges and universities,” Vavi added.

Furthermore, the statement revealed the mistreatment faced by lecturers and other workers across Educor institutions. They submitted their grievances to the union.

These include:

• the norm of late wage/salary payments,
• the unjust transition of lecturers from permanent to fixed-term contracts during the Covid-19 pandemic,
• the absence of necessary tools of trade such as textbooks and laptops, and;
• unprofessional handling of workers’ grievances.

Moreover, Vavi said Educor’s behaviour disproved that the private sector is a “paragon of efficiency”.

“The proponents of privatisation tell us that privatisation makes services better, cheaper, and that private ownership is accountable and efficient. Educor has proven that all these are myths,” he added.  Additionally, he said the chronic understaffing at Damelin and its sister colleges, the incompetence and poor management that resulted in unfair labour practice, late payment of employees and the eventual bankruptcy demonstrate that the private sector does not always deliver on these promises.

READ MORE: Four ‘dysfunctional’ Educor colleges have been deregistered, says Nzimande

AdvTech’s support for Educor students

In a contrasting move, AdvTech, part of the ADvTECH Group, has expressed solidarity with the affected Educor students.

“We stand by the Educor students and are committed to supporting them in successfully completing their qualifications,” said Shevon Lurie, director of The Independent Institute of Education (IIE), the higher education division of ADvTECH.

Laurie said the IIE has established a centralised process to address student queries, provide guidance on transferring to The IIE, and review each student’s financial circumstances and academic transcript.

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“Affected students who would like to enquire about their options of transferring to The IIE can e-mail registrar@iie.ac.za. The office will assist students with queries regarding similar qualifications, the nearest campus to consider, and the process for applying for academic credits.

“Each student’s financial circumstances and academic transcript will be holistically reviewed,” Laurie added.

Furthermore, the transfer process outlined by The IIE involves finding similar qualifications and National Qualifications Framework (NQF) levels in the chosen field of study, ensuring that students meet the admission criteria.

Conducting an academic credit mapping exercise will assess the overlap between modules completed by students and those on the transfer qualification.

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Students extremely disappointed

Damelin students said they were baffled to see that their college was deregistered on the news. One of the students said they thought it was not true until they saw Blade Nzimande’s briefing on Wednesday.

“We don’t know where we stand. We doubt we will find jobs with these qualifications because the institution has a bad record. They must reimburse us,” said the student.

Furthermore, speaking to the SABC on Thursday, disgruntled students from the Randburg Damelin College expressed their disappointment in the lack of formal communication from the college regarding any eventualities that may follow.

“It’s crazy how this happened in like three months. They never communicated and they have not said a single word to us so I think that Damelin is cooked, just know that,” said one of the students.

“With everything that is going on, the part that really alarmed me the most was that we have been here over a month and the head office gives us calls to ask if we are actually interested in coming into the institution, so that tells you that the communication between head office and the branches is not 100%, which means that there is something they’re not telling us, so maybe this branch is eating the money from the students,” added another student.