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Government bonds varsity, college graduates
Zimbabwe National Students Union (ZINASU)
May 21, 2007

The Zimbabwe National Students Union (ZINASU), representing 43 institutions of higher learning and more than 260 000 students in the 10 provinces of Zimbabwe is shocked but not surprised by the purported introduction of the bonding system to college and university student graduates. The bonding or cadetship scheme was confirmed by the permanent secretary of Higher and Tertiary Education, Dr. Washington Mbizvo in The Sunday Mail of May 20-26 2007. The decision by the government is misguided because it gives the impression that it is sponsoring students in tertiary education in the country when it is common cause that the bankrupt administration in Harare long stopped this programme due to unbridled corruption, gross mismanagement of the economy and its mischievous policy that students in higher education were opposition political elements.

The new scheme is another great betrayal to the students of Zimbabwe and a direct attack on the right to education enshrined in the African Charter on Human and People's Rights and the International Covenant on Social, Economic and Cultural Rights on the following premises:

1. Technically, there is no student in Zimbabwe who is getting grants or loans from the government. Students were asked to complete state loan forms 3 months ago but up to now nothing has materialized. The semester is about to end without any loans for the suffering students. 90% of the students are living in abject and chronic poverty and are sponsoring their own education. How then can the government bond students that it is not sponsoring? If this is not madness then God help this regime.

2. We would also like to remind the government that more than 95% of the civil servants are living below the poverty datum line (PDL), which, according to Central Statistics Office (CSO) is currently pegged at $ZW 1 700 000. Given such, bonding all college and university graduates will automatically mean that they will all fall under the PDL. The starting point for all government employees is ZW$490 000, thus bonding in other words is euphemism for condemning young Zimbabweans into abject poverty.

3. There is no any single child of a senior government official who is studying here in Zimbabwe, henceforth, they are not affected by the new scheme. Their children and relatives are studying abroad and benefiting from the world class education systems there.

4. The scheme is a violation of the initial contract between the students and the provider of initial educational funds (Commercial Bank of Zimbabwe Bank, Metropolitan Bank) on behalf of the State. By signing loan forms, the students bound themselves by a caveat that they would repay the funds in the stipulated period. The bonding system on this basis is arguably outside the scope of the contract.

5. The students, being the major stakeholders were never consulted prior to the purported introduction of the scheme. This further exposes the FLAWED EDUCATION POLICY in Zimbabwe, which by and large views students as periphery stakeholders. Students therefore refuse to be used to resurrect a dying regime by being turned into objects of cheap labor by a government that has destroyed the economic infrastructure of this country.

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