Classes are underway at the University of Namibia (UNAM) main campus and its satellite campuses, but for many senior students, the real hurdle is not the syllabus – it's the overdue balance. 

The University of Namibia today announced a critical lifeline – a new policy allowing qualifying seniors with debt under N$50.000 to register and keep their graduation dreams alive. 

UNAM's Public Relations and Media Operations manager, Simon Namesho, explained the rationale behind this development on the Namibia Connects programme. 

"Well, what we have seen in our data is that we have students, our returning students particularly, who have not registered yet. Now when we look into the data, it was showing us that most of them have historic debt, even though they have balanced funding with them at their disposal, and they were blocked because of that historic debt. So now with this move, it will allow all of the students, especially our returning students, to be able to register for the 2026 academic year."  

Namesho further touched on the reasoning behind choosing N$50,000 as the specific amount and what happens to students who fall just above that amount. 

"Most of the debts that we have fall under N$20.000. That's the majority of our students that we have. So those are the majority of our debt with historic debt who cannot register for this academic year. So that data then has informed us of a threshold of N$50,000. So that means every student, including returning students that have been tricked at below N$50,000, can now register without any financial block this academic year."

He added that students that have a threshold that is above that amount are then asked and encouraged to break down that historic debt to below or just at N$50,000 to be able to be eligible for this arrangement.

"If, for example, you have your debt at N$52.000, you are then asked to pay at least that N$2.000 to bring down your historic debt from N$52.000 to N$50.000, and then you can be unblocked."

Postgraduate scholars at the moment are not included, and those who are in a financial conundrum, Namesho stressed, are reminded to approach UNAM for alternative arrangements. 
Students have until the 16th of February, 2026, to sign their payment agreements.