Acting head of the SIU Leonard Lekgetho. (SA government/Facebook)
The Special Investigating Unit (SIU) is seeking to recover R8 million linked to the Free State provincial government’s irregular awarding of bursaries in a scandal involving deceased students, foreigners and ineligible beneficiaries, says its acting head, Leonard Lekgetho.
The SIU investigated the Free State provincial government’s bursary scheme during former premier Sisi Ntombela’s tenure and uncovered serious maladministration, unauthorised bursary awards and irregular expenditure by officials between 2017 to 2023.
“Officials awarded bursaries to their relatives, the deceased and foreign nationals, as well as ineligible officials and left millions of rand in university accounts unaccounted for,” Lekgetho said at a briefing on Tuesday.
The bursary scheme, authorised by President Cyril Ramaphosa, was intended to support financially disadvantaged students in accessing higher education and to address shortages in scarce skills. The auditor-general’s 2020 report flagged irregularities in the province’s bursary award system.
