Anger over South African fees mounts

Students across South Africa are demonstrating against proposed fees increases at the country’s universities, but also for wider reform, in protests that threaten to ground activities at many of the institutions.

The students say higher fees will further disadvantage black learners in Africa’s most advanced economy who had little access to universities during decades of white apartheid rule, even as the varsity administrators counter that without bigger subsidies from the government they have no option but to raise fees to maintain academic standards.

With the popular Twitter hashtag #FeesMustFall, it is an affordability struggle that would resonate on the continent. In March, students at Makerere University, Uganda’s oldest and most prestigious, went on strike, protesting a demand by administrators that they pay up all fees due before they were allowed to learn and sit tests.

Under pressure, the institution extended its payment deadline but the rioting students said this was not sufficient. “We shall fight until the last drop of blood because the two weeks are not enough for our parents to clear the millions” the private Daily Monitor quoted Joseph Asiimwe, a second year student of computer sciences, as saying at the time.

The Makerere students’ concerns would reflect the steep cost of universities in Africa, where high levels of poverty see many struggle to raise tuition and school sustenance fees.

Even then, demand for higher education on the continent remains brisk.  There are an estimated 2,500 institutions of higher learning in Africa, but less than 1,000 of these are universities. 

In 1991, Africa had only 2.7 million students, by the end of this year projections are of 18-20 million students, according to the World Bank. Despite this, the African Union projects that only 10% of Africans have enrolled for tertiary education.

But in addition to underinvestment in physical infrastructure such as new institutions, the cost of attending is the main impediment. 

Makerere for example charges the highest fees of any public institution in the East African country, at $1,014 annually for the Bachelor of Medicine course.