The former Acting Chief Executive Officer of the Namibia Students Financial Assistance Fund (NSFAF), Kennedy Kandume, has clarified that his resignation was a personal rather than a forced decision.
This follows the reintegration of the fund into the Ministry of Education.

Kandume emphasised that his exit was not prompted by any dispute or external pressure, but rather by his personal decision not to transition into the ministry after the reintegration took effect on 1 March 2026.

Kandume, who has served as acting CEO since April 2018, explained that one of his key mandates, alongside the NSFAF board, was to oversee the reintegration of the fund into the ministry.

This process, however, experienced significant delays over the years.
The delays, he says, were largely due to legislative hurdles, particularly the amendment or repeal of the governing Act. 

With the reintegration achieved, Kandume said he felt his mission had been fulfilled after an eight-year tenure during which he played a role in steering institutional reforms within NSFAF.

"One on the repeal of the act or amendment of the act, which was achieved at the beginning of last year, and since then, really, we were up to a task to reintegrate. When I say 'we', it is together with the board, and then the reintegration happened, and I just felt like I had done my part. The fund is reintegrated, and let somebody else take over from the ministry and let me follow a different path altogether. Really, that's really the issue. It's not that they signed anything that prompted me not to be part of the reintegrated NSFAF."

In a recent interview with NBC News, the general secretary of the Namibia Financial Institutions Union (NFIU), Samuel Vries, said the integration process has had detrimental effects on employees and was carried out without proper consultation.

The integration process, Vries says, does not take into account the duration employees have spent acting in higher positions, which he describes as prejudicial.

The union has escalated the matter and formally referred the dispute to the Office of the Labour Commissioner.
A hearing date has now been scheduled, with proceedings expected to take place in April.