CAPE TOWN - Members of the public have until the close of business on Tuesday to submit their views on a draft bill seeking to root out fake degrees and impose stricter penalties on people found to be lying about their academic qualifications.
In a statement on Monday, Parliament's portfolio committee on higher education and training said the public participation process was critical to the bill's passage through the legislature.
"The bill seeks to deal decisively with misrepresentation of qualifications in our system. The committee wants to make cheating history and ensure that our people are correctly accredited for what they have qualified for," said Connie September, committee chairwoman.
"This is an incredible step as it protects the credibility of our system and the workplace from being blindsided by the mere attendance of foreign universities.
"Fraudulent qualifications and misrepresentation will no longer go undetected and unpunished."
