Professor of Education at Stellenbosch University, Jonathan Jansen says that universities could face corruption from individuals wanting to enrich themselves. Universities receive billions of rands in funding annually and could attract vultures according to Jansen.
Jansen explained that the budgets received by the country’s universities tally up to more than R87 Billion annually. These budgets may attract people who do not view universities as places of learning, teaching and research, but rather as places where they can steal.
They said, “There is rampant theft going on running into tens of millions of rands at several of our universities, not only the rural isolated universities but also some of our big urban universities”.
Where there is a lot of money, people come to steal.
Jansen recently released his book Corrupted: A Study of Chronic Dysfunction in South African Universities which looks at corruption and its impact on institutions of higher learning institutions.
They say the purpose of the book is not to expose corruption at universities but rather look at the corrosive effect it has on the thousands of students attending the institutions.
With every cent that is stolen, there is a student who cannot access higher education, there's a student that cannot get decent accommodation, and there is a student that cannot progress because of the lack of books.
Jansen says effective leadership is critical in ensuring that corruption does not fester at universities, further adding that the size of a university’s council must be reduced and made up of a balance of individuals who are experts in their fields without political loyalties.
They say the political representatives of universities must only make up a small minority of their councils, the majority of these councils must be made up of individuals with expertise in finance and expertise in legal matters.
