MEHRD waits for ‘cheques to be ready’ before paying SIG students their dues
BY MAVIS N PODOKOLO
Allowances from last year are yet to be paid to Government sponsored students at the local university SINU and rural training centres.
The ministry of education (MEHRD) says it is waiting for ‘cheques’ to be ready before it can start paying students their overdue allowances.
Permanent Secretary for Ministry of Education and Human Resources Development Dr Franco Rodie told this at a press conference last week at the prime minister’s office.
“To answer the questions of when will the government give students’ allowances. My response is when the cheques are ready to be paid, thank you very much,” he said.
Rodie there are internal processes that did not allow the quick payment of the 2022 allowances.
“The key reason is the all the payments last year was halted so we got to re-raise them again,” he said.
“As far as I know this is based on the requisition that I’ve sighted most of the payments have been made but I cannot give you the figures because I don’t have it in terms of those who are yet to be paid. The internal processes have contributed to the delay.”
He said the other factor that triggered the delay is that some students did not provide their enrolment details in the required timeframe as per SITESA’s requests.
Rodie adds that the internal delay is caused by internal payment process both at the Ministry level or SITESA and at the Ministry of Finance and Treasury (MFOT).
