South Africa to name and shame fake qualification holders

The South African Qualifications Authority (Saqa) will register the names of holders of fake certificates on its website, says Minister in the Presidency responsible for Planning, Monitoring and Evaluation Jeff Radebe, who reveals that as at end-January, 2017, a total of 1,276 qualifications, including 444 national and 832 foreign qualifications, have been recorded on Saqa’s list of misrepresented qualifications.

"Seventy-eight affidavits have been completed for handover to the Hawks (the Directorate for Priority Crime Investigation) for prosecution," Radebe added when briefing the media yesterday on the coutcomes of the cabinet meeting held in Cape Town on Wednesday.

Radebe said the government was securing the credibility of qualifications and the higher education system. 

The announcement by Higher Education and Training Minister Blade Nzimande on action to be taken against holders of fake qualifications, including prosecuting and publicly naming and shaming them, would contribute to ending the growing prevalence of qualification forgeries, he added.

Giving an update on the National Student Financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS), Radebe said that since the implementation of the NSFAS recoveries strategy, collections per month had increased as a result of the various initiatives.

"To date, 268.4 million Rand (about US$21 million) have been collected against the annual target of 285 million rand. The revised Funding Framework for universities has been finalised and will be consulted with the university sector before being published," said Radebe.

- Bernama-NNN-Sa News