State stops placing students in cash-strapped private varsities

At least 31 private universities are staring at a bleak future after Members of Parliament (MPs) yesterday banned the placement of government-sponsored students to the institutions.

Lawmakers yesterday approved a report of the Budget and Appropriation Committee on the 2023-24 Budget Policy Statement, which spells out priority expenditures for the government, and directed the Kenya Universities and College Placement Services (KUCCPS) to stop placing government sponsored students to private universities.

The statement shows the government has terminated exchequer funding for private universities beginning the next Financial Year. KUCCPS is the only institution mandated by law to place Form Four graduates in universities and colleges.

“That, in the next cycle of placements (2023), the State Department for Higher Education and Research, through the Kenya Universities and colleges Central Placement Service, should not place new government sponsored students in private universities,” the report States.

Move comes at a time when the government is struggling to fund public universities that are choked with debts amounting to over Sh56.1 billion as of June 2022.

In the last four years, private campuses have received grants worth Sh8.7 billion from the government at the expense of public universities.

Accumulated debt

According to the Universities Fund, most public universities are on the verge of collapsing due to indebtedness and inability to pay statutory deductions, such as Paye, Sacco and bank loan repayments and remittances to the NHIF and NSSF for health insurance and retirement benefits respectively. The accumulated debt also includes payments for part-time lecturers and contractors among others.

Universities owe contractors Sh1.4 billion, part-time lecturers Sh4.5 billion, suppliers Sh4.8 billion and Sacco’s Sh4.1 billion. Documents tabled before the National Assembly’s Public Investments Committee on Governance and Education shows that the Sh8.7 billion received as grants is over and above Sh12.1 billion private universities received from the Higher Education Loans Board.

According to documents from Universities Fund in the 2017/18 Financial Year, private universities received Sh1.6 billion as grants for 18,587 students, in 2018/19FY they received Sh1.98 billion for 29,729 students, in 2019/20 FY they received Sh2.5 billion for 43,676 students while in the 2020/21 Financial Year they received Sh2.7 billion.

Of the 30 universities among the top beneficiaries include Mount Kenya that gets Sh552.3 million for 12,479 students, Kabarak, Sh357.9 million for 7,715 students, Catholic University of East Africa Sh196.9 million for 4,685 students, Kenya College of Accountancy  gets Sh223.9 billion for 5,142 students, university of Eastern African Baraton Sh183 billion for 4222 students and Zetech University Sh115.4 million for 2,836 students