Educor, the owners of private higher learning institutions such as City Varsity, Damelin, Icesa City Campus and Lyceum College scrambled on Friday to allay the fears of hundreds of students after the department of higher education dropped a bombshell that the institutions would be deregistered.
The department’s director-general, Sibusiso Sishi, who is also the registrar of private higher education institutions, said in a government gazette that the colleges had failed to submit audited annual financial statements for the 2020 financial year.
Students and a lecturer said they had not known about the gazetted notice, and its revelation took them by surprise.
A first-year Damelin IT student said it will be bad if students are punished for the incompetence of the directors and management of Educor in failing to submit the relevant compliance documents.
“This is bad for us as we are not paying peanuts here. Our parents sacrifice a lot for us to get educated,” said the student from Germiston.
Another student who only identified himself as Michael said: “I am shocked and if Damelin gets deregistered I will need to find an alternative institution to further my studies. But it is a known fact that the management and directors of Educor are a big mess. We wouldn’t be here if it was not because of their incompetence.”
A third-year marketing student said if Educor institutions were deregistered, students should be refunded in full as they cannot end up with certificates that are not recognised.
A lecturer at City Varsity said he was not surprised as there were a lot of challenges in the holding company’s top management, and the institution itself.
However, Educor said on Friday it was surprised that the department had issued the notice on August 19, while the notice was signed on June 30.
Educor spokesperson Dassie Moodley said: “The publication cites that the only outstanding information to complete the annual submission was the annual financial statements… the necessary audited financial statements for the institutions City Varsity, Icesa, Damelin and Lyceum College were provided to the Department of Higher Education and Training on 15 and 28 July 2022 respectively.”
For more education news from Sunday World, click here.
Follow @SundayWorldZA on Twitter @sundayworldza on Instagram, or like our Facebook Page, Sunday World, by clicking here for the latest breaking news in South Africa. To Subscribe to Sunday World, click here.
