SIU Just Uncovered MILLIONS Of Rands BURSARY Payed To FOREIGNERS & DISEASED Students| Free State

Added: 2026-06-03

[00:00:00]Almost everyone in South Africa is working very very hard paying taxes and believing that government burseries are helping poor and deserving students build a better future. Now imagine discovering that some of that money allegedly went to relatives of officials, foreign nationals, government employees who did not qualify and even a deceased student. Yes, you heard me correctly, a dead student. While poor struggling students are getting kicked out of high education facilities every day because of not having means to pay their tuition fees. 579,000 rands was spent on seven foreign nationals on fraud burseries by the office of the premier of Free State. The special investigating unit has just pulled back the curtain on what could become one of the most shocking corrupted bursery scandals in recent years. South Africans. Welcome to News23. My name is Nick. Please like this video right now. Subscribe as I explain everything about this scandal.

[00:00:58]According to the SIU, more than 8.3 million rands in public funds was irregularly spent through the Free State Office of the Premier's Bursery Scheme, a program that was supposed to open doors for struggling young people, how did this even happen? Who approved these payments? And how many deserving students may have lost opportunities while foreigners are literally chawing our tax monies? So I'll go through the statement whereby the special investigating unit investigation into the affairs of the office of the premier in the free state has uncovered serious maladministration and an author unauthorized awarding of bazaris and irregular expenditure by officials. The fifth state provincial government allocated funds to support needy student in accessing higher education and to address the shortage of scarce skills in the province through bazaris.

[00:01:57]Each year funding is provided for free state student pursuing scarce skills profession at higher education institution. However, officials awarded bazar to their relatives, the deceased and foreign nationals as well as to ineligible officials and left millions of rent in university account unac accounted for.

[00:02:25]The investigation was authorized by President Sarah Ramaposa under proclamation R123 of 2023.

[00:02:33]Two progress report outlining the investigation's finding was submitted to the president with the final report due to be submitted in September. The investigation was initiated following referral from the auditor general of South Africa concerning irregularities.

[00:02:52]The AGSA report from 2019 to 2020 revealed serious irregularities in the management of bazaris and funds intended to educate and uplift youth in the free state province.

[00:03:12]In terms of irregular barisary approval, the SIU investigate revealed that official approved baseri negently failed to comply with the eligibility criteria and irregularly extended the basary contract. One official awarded bazar to relative without following due process. An official did not submit a bazar application for his studies which commenced in 2017 but ended up receiving funding. The bazar application was submitted by official in 2017 for 2018 academic year and did not meet the requirement of the 11th May 2016 human resource strategy and development curriculum for 2017 academic year.

[00:04:04]Certain student failed some of the modules during the studies but the basary contracts were never terminated by the office of the premier and continue from this from a three-year contract to a 7-year contract meaning that the degree which supposed to be finalized in three year end up ended up being finalized in seven years and through the seven years the bazari was awarded. Some applicant received bazari for qualification that were not part of the 2018 stroke 2019 provincial workspace workplace skill plan. In some instances the required process were not followed before this approval for the bazaris. An official who applied for an international government funded bazari received the benefit while in office and continued to receive them after resigning from the off from the government. A copy of an incomplete memorandum of understanding provided by the office of the premier provide I mean between the office of the premier and the international tertiary institution provided that the institution will contribute 65% towards the scholarship and the office of the premier will contribute 35%. However, the SIU found a contradicting in in the agreement where the office of the premier eventually contributed 65% of the scholarship instead of 35% which was supposed to have been awarded. This has resulted in a regular expenditure of over 8.3 million which SIU is now seeking to recover.

[00:05:50]When we go through the details in relation to the deceased, the investigation confirmed that a deceased student has received a basary from both office of the premier and NSF.

[00:06:04]Office of the premier paid 34.8 million 34.8 8 not 34,000 to the university of the Free State which deposited the money into the suspense account after the student's death and NSF paid 13,000 into the student's bank account which his parents used since the student had died before the completion of the of his studies. The fund could not be uncovered especially since the proclamation did not cover the NSF uh period. The parent also lacked the means to pay back the money that was deposited into the students account.

[00:06:50]The SIU identified the official who approved the basary and extensions resulting in the payments of 34,000 as well as funding causes the student fail to complete resulting in the breach of contract of contractual and policy obligation.

[00:07:11]The second one is the foreign national funded with uh without approval. The investigation showed that seven student who received bazaritis from the office of the premier were foreign nationals with six of them funded on merit basis as top achiever. However, they say SIU found no approval to to deviate from basary policy which specified that basary are for South African citizen residing in the free state and this has resulted in expenditure of 579,000 which was spent by office of the premier on those foreign foreign uh student government official as basar recipient the investigation found that during 2019 stroke 2020 financial year government official receive a full-time basary to attend V various university. The basary policy state that while official can apply for a parttime bazari they were not eligible for a full-time basary scheme.

[00:08:22]Excessive stippen payment.

[00:08:24]Bazaar recipient receives stipent from provincial government and v with varying amount for local and international students.

[00:08:35]However, our investigation uncovered that some student receive excessive sum totaling 1.8 million. The office of the premier stated that it has started reclaiming the fund from student who studied abroad and did not fulfill their buzzer commitment. To prevent duplication, the SIU requested the office of the premier to proceed with the recovery and to keep the SIU informed on the progress and the outcome through the office of the director general.

[00:09:10]Then there's a other focus where there was suspense account negligence and recovery of public funds. The investigation found that official did not properly monitor excess found excess fund in university suspense account leaving million unused.

[00:09:29]The SIU tracked down and recovered 6.3 million from seven universities.

[00:09:38]Furthermore, the SIU has signed 18 acknowledgement of debt totaling 1.9 million with individual who receive undue benefits from the Bazar scheme and to date we have recovered 283,000 that has been received through this installment. The acknowledging acknowledgation of depth we sign it when we recover that a student has received a buzzer that they do not qualify for and because they don't have money so we entered into agreement with them that they must pay money installment. So on this 18 acknowledgement of debt which is uh totaling 1.9 million we are busy recovering on a monthly basis from those student who were not eligible to receive those bazaries disciplinary and criminal referrals. The SIU has made 36 disciplinary referrals against implicated official including human resource officer, administrative cl assistant directors, deputy directors and directors for contravening public finance management act and free state basic.

[00:10:54]In addition, evidence indicating the commission of criminal offense against seven individual has been referred to the National Prosecuting Authority for possible prosecution on charges including fraud, theft, money laundering.

[00:11:10]These referrals are not symbolic. They represent SIU unwavering commitment to accountability, ensuring that those who abuse power face the full weight of the law. And in conclusion, the SI investigated is exposed not just maladministration but moral favor, a collapse in civic duty and ethical leaders leadership.

[00:11:37]Official turn opportunity into exploitation and service into self-interest. They evaluated the trust of the people and the vision of our democracy.

[00:11:50]But through recoveries, disciplinary action and criminal referrals and systemic reform, the SIU is reclaiming the trust. We are building, we are rebuilding the bridges between education and nation building, between responsibility and justice. The SIU will continue to pursue every scent, every official and every act of misconduct until the Bazari scheme once again stand for what it was meant to provide for and hope, opportunity and power of education to build a nation.

[00:12:30]As I close, I would like to thank the premier and her office for working with the SIU team and being available whenever we require documents or additional information. I would also like to thank the auditor general for continue to collaborate by referring the outcome of their reports to the SIU.

[00:12:53]I extend my gratitude to the SIU member who continue to work selflessly to ensure we deliver on our mandate and to South African to serve with pride and joy as a token of our gratitude for your ongoing support. That's the thank you to all South African.

[00:13:18]That's the statement from us. As you would have seen that we have made several referrals pertaining to criminal and to disciplinary referrals and as a result as indicated the DGS in the in the forum and the premier they will be in the position to able to indicate what has happened in terms of the referrals and we are continuing to engage the NPA in terms of the criminal referrals regarding the referrals that we have made so that action can be taken.

[00:13:50]pertaining to those who have really h done wrong. And with regard to recovery, we are also continue to make sure that we recover all the sense that has been spent pertaining to the bazari that was irregularly awarded. With that, I thank you and I'm sorry for hopping on on on the family of the deceased, unfortunately.

[00:14:18]I'm just wondering, so the family is saying that they're not able to send the money back and they weren't even aware of the money. Um, but then would the money then not be sitting idle somewhere if they weren't even aware of it?

[00:14:33]>> Yeah. Well, uh, this particular case of this particular family is such that indeed the money was paid after the student in question had ceased to leave. So, so, so the bon the honors was then left on the family to do indicate to the SIU how did how do this payment come to into the picture and unfortunately the family has not been made aware. We went into the family uh through our various investigative methods to make a financial assessment and uh make a thorough legal determination as to what could be the circumstances and indeed we came to a determination that it has been a difficult situation for the family and uh one of the things that actually became of interest to us which then goes back to your question Mr. such that someone who authorized these funds might have done that knowingly or unknowingly. But the the the the indications are that this was a known orchestrated scheme and as part of consequence management is one key case study that we have flagged and to which we need to ensure that the amount paid to the diseased to to the diseased students family is also recovered and the person who made that payment >> sure >> bears the honors to make sure that that money is paid. It's it is an inconvenience to the family in question.

[00:16:06]We are very much sympathetic and yet the family unfortunately was used as a conduit to release the funds in an unauthorized manner.

[00:16:17]>> Yeah. Um