Students gamble away NSFAS funds: a ticking time bomb for financial stability

As South Africa’s gambling industry continues to boom, university students have been drawn into online betting, using their National Student Financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS) allowances and internship salaries to chase quick wins that often leave them worse off.

The National Gambling Board’s 2024/25 annual report shows the industry generated R1.5-trillion in turnover, up from R1.1-trillion the previous financial year. Behind those record figures are students who admit they only recognised the dangers of gambling after losing money meant for food, transport and other essentials.

Students wager NSFAS allowances and their futures at online betting sites

Gambling with their future — students wager NSFAS allowances at betting sites

October 20, 2025

Students who spoke recently to Daily Maverick on condition of anonymity described how betting began as harmless entertainment before gradually becoming a habit that consumed money they could not afford to lose.

A third-year student from Cape Peninsula University of Technology said he had been convinced that he could beat the odds because of his football knowledge. “I was like, ‘Let me just put maybe R10 and see how it goes’, and then when I started winning, I was like, ‘This is nice; let me continue and then see how it goes’, and then came a point where I just realised that this is a matter of luck, not actually understanding soccer, and then that’s when I realised that I’m also taking money for bread, money for essentials,” the student said.

“There was a point where I took almost R600 before I even bought groceries just to gamble, and then it was during those moments where I realised that I’m not doing myself any justice, and then I stopped. This year, I haven’t used any of my NSFAS money to do any gambling activities. I’ve been clean,” he said.

Another student, now in his fourth year and completing an internship, said he only recently closed his betting account after years of gambling. “I stopped two or three days ago. I contacted Betway support in terms of how to cancel my account because apparently in the Betway platform you cannot deactivate it manually; you have to request it by email. I am 23. I started gambling probably at 18 or 19. I can say that if I carry on in the next five years or ten years, I’ll be losing rather than putting my money in some places like investments,” the student said.

He said the cycle of winning and losing is what keeps people betting. “It’s the edge of losing that one game, two games. It’s the loop of when you win, you’re like, ‘Yeah, I’m the man’. You feel great, and you’re trying to carry on; that’s where things start escalating. I remember I won, and I withdrew the whole money, and I can tell you right now more than 40% of that money went back to Betway. There’s no winning; the house always wins – that’s the saying they always say,” the student said.

Call for intervention in online gambling

Daily Maverick has reported that political parties such as Rise Mzansi have been vocal in Parliament about online gambling and issues of advertising. It called on the Minister of Trade and Industry and Competition, Parks Tau, to ensure that gambling companies reduce advertising and the use of influencers.

According to the National Gambling Board’s 2024/25 annual report, the Western Cape, run by the Democratic Alliance (DA), saw the highest gross gambling revenue and collection of taxes/levies.

In 2024, the DA introduced a Remote Gambling Bill to make the issuance of gambling licences the responsibility of the relevant provincial authorities not the centralised National Gambling Board (NGB), and to regulate the online gambling industry.

“The DA does support tighter restrictions. The precise nature of these restrictions are under discussion at the National Gambling Policy Council,” Toby Chance, the DA’s spokesperson on trade, industry and competition, told Daily Maverick.

“The DA has made its position clear in Parliament’s portfolio committee on trade, industry and competition that the proliferation of unrestricted advertising and marketing has fuelled online gambling and sports betting, which has had negative social consequences,” he said

Speaking on student involvement in gambling, Chance said: “Students are one of several potentially vulnerable groups, including school children and social grant recipients. More work needs to be done with banks and other financial communications services providers to increase the friction of accessing online gambling and betting sites.”

The problem starts long before university

The growing impact of gambling on students was recently the focus of a Gambling and Student Wellbeing symposium at Stellenbosch University, organised by the South African Association of Senior Student Affairs Professionals (Saassap) and the Higher Health initiative. Researchers, university leaders and policymakers gathered to examine how gambling is affecting students.

Dr Thelma Oppelt, from the University of the Western Cape’s Centre for Interdisciplinary Studies of Children, Families and Society, said gambling harm should not be viewed as an individual failing but as a public health issue driven by the industry’s business model.

“The single-most important thing I can say here is that gambling is not a student problem created by university life. Students carry into higher education everything they absorbed before they arrived: the normalisation of betting they witnessed at home; the aspirational framing of gambling they absorbed through advertising; and the accumulated economic precarity of households where income has always been uncertain and where the idea that a bet could change your circumstances is not irrational, it is the logical response to a situation where formal economic pathways have repeatedly disappointed,” Oppelt said.

She said waiting until students reach university is already too late. “The evidence on help-seeking delays in gambling disorder consistently shows a gap of approximately four years between when a person recognises they have a problem and when they seek help. If we are only designing responses at the tertiary education level, we are responding to a problem that has been developing since adolescence or earlier… Schools need gambling harm literacy programmes that start in the senior primary phase, not after learners have smartphones and betting accounts,” Oppelt said.

Universities step up efforts

Saassap president and University of the Witwatersrand Dean of Students Jerome September said universities have begun responding to the growing crisis. He said Saassap’s partners will establish a community of practice dedicated to addressing student gambling and its impact on student wellbeing, success and financial vulnerability.

“Online gambling is a R1.5-trillion industry, and 65% (the global average is 45%) of South African adults gamble. Problematic gambling is at around 31%. We have not had studies done in South Africa to determine the prevalence among students, but international literature puts problematic gambling behaviour among students at 10%. There is thus an urgent need for a comprehensive study to give us a sense of the numbers,” September said.

Meanwhile, the NGB and NSFAS have forged a partnership to tackle the student gambling crisis. Lungile Dukwana, acting CEO of the NGB, said the peak operational period for campus activations was between February and May 2026, at Mahikeng City College in North West, Rhodes Technical FET College in Northern Cape and at three North-West University campuses.

READ MORE:

NSFAS and gambling board unite to curb student online betting crisis

February 19, 2026

However, Dukwana said a survey has yet to be undertaken to determine whether the campaign has made an impact. ‘NGB will be conducting a prevalence study on gambling by the end of FY2026/27 and envisages that metrics will be available,” he said.

The NSFAS told Daily Maverick that its full on-campus roll-out has yet to commence. “The awareness activities are expected to be kick-started through a July 2026 launch, after which the rollout will proceed in line with the approved implementation plan... No early impact metrics are available at this stage, as the full campus rollout has not yet started. Student feedback and impact indicators will be tracked once implementation begins,” NSFAS said.

Matshepo Dibetso, spokesperson for the Deputy Minister of Higher Education and Training, Dr Nomusa Dube-Ncube, told Daily Maverick that interventions are ongoing. “The department engages regularly with relevant regulatory bodies and stakeholders to ensure our institutions are supported in protecting students. The deputy minister has directed that these partnerships be strengthened, particularly to reach the students who are most vulnerable, and more will be shared as those engagements progress.” DM