Key to unlock their future
It's time to stop making excuses. Real change demands a shift in mindset and unwavering political will.
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Hindustan Times
10 minutes ago
- Hindustan Times
State issues directive on college fees to make admissions fairer
Mumbai: The state government has directed newly approved vocational and professional colleges to strictly follow the fee structure approved by the Fee Regulatory Authority (FRA) and the Fee Policy Committee (FPC). Colleges that violate these provisions will face actions by the state. State issues directive on college fees to make admissions fairer The move comes after several students and parents complained that some institutions were charging a higher fees than the sanctioned amount. The issue came to light during the centralised admission process (CAP) conducted by the directorate of technical education and the state common entrance examination (CET) cell. The state higher and technical education department issued a circular on Monday stating that under the Maharashtra Private Professional Educational Institutions (Regulation of Admission and Fees) Act, 2015, it is mandatory for colleges to display their course-wise fees. As per the act, colleges must display the fee structure in both Marathi and English, in a way that is clearly visible to students and parents. The information must also be available on their official websites for every academic year. The circular reads, 'The government has made it clear that no institution is allowed to charge more than the approved fee for a professional degree, or postgraduate and diploma courses.' It adds that institutions are also prohibited from collecting fees for more than one academic year at a time. As per the circular, if colleges demand any extra payment, whether in cash or kind, it will be treated as embezzlement under the law. These rules are aimed at preventing exploitation of students during admissions, especially those coming from economically weaker backgrounds, or relying on scholarships. Many students have complained that they felt pressured to pay unapproved amounts just to secure their seats. This would often lead to financial stress for their families. By enforcing the existing rules, the state hopes to make the admission process more transparent and fair. If students are demanded any additional fees, they can register complaints with the government or the institution's board of directors through a designated helpline, which will be made available at the State General Examination Room. A member of the FRA committee, Dharmendra Mishra, advised students to read certain sections of the Act and regularly check the official websites of their colleges for fee details. 'If students or parents notice any discrepancy in the fees, they should first approach the principal and then bring the matter to the FRA,' he said. Mishra said that in the previous academic year, the FRA had received many complaints about hiked fees, but most came from people who were not directly affected, which made it difficult to take action against colleges. 'We urge students to file complaints directly with the FRA so that we can take proper action,' he added. FRA contact details: Tel No: 022-31980348 / 8828786264 Email:
Qatar Tribune
an hour ago
- Qatar Tribune
Tourism sector contributes QR55 billion to Qatar's GDP in 2024: Qatar Tourism
Earlier this year, Qatar Tourism announced that the tourism sector as a whole contributed QR55 billion to the country's GDP in 2024, accounting for an estimated 8% of the total economy, a 14 percent increase compared to 2023. This demonstrates clear progress towards the Tourism Strategy 2030 target of raising the sector's contribution to 10-12 percent of GDP. Qatar's strong tourism performance is the result of a robust strategy led by Qatar Tourism and supported by its promotional arm, Visit Qatar. In the first half of the year, Visit Qatar launched several regional and global media campaigns to attract visitors from key target markets. This included the recent 'Moments Made for You' campaign, which highlights the range of experiences available during the summer season and invites visitors from GCC countries and beyond to discover Qatar. Visit Qatar also released a promotional film featuring English footballer David Beckham, showcasing the country's diverse tourism offerings, from heritage and culture to modern attractions and natural sites. Additionally, Visit Qatar expanded its stopover promotion campaigns, focusing on priority markets including the United Kingdom, United States of America, South Africa, China and Australia. These campaigns coincided with major events such as the Qatar Toy Festival, which recently completed its third edition, attracting over 130,000 visitors, a 12% increase from the previous year. Other notable events included the Doha Jewellery and Watches Exhibition 2025, Ras Abrouq, Sealine Season, Shop Qatar, and Qatar International Food Festival, alongside key initiatives such as Scoop on the Sea and the ongoing whale shark tours. Engineer Abdulaziz Ali Al-Mawlawi, Chief Executive Officer of Visit Qatar, said: 'Our success in the first half of 2025 demonstrates sustained momentum and growing confidence from regional and global markets in Qatar's tourism offerings. We have attracted more visitors through a distinctive combination of major events, international campaigns, and innovative tourism products that cater to a wide range of interests. We will continue to invest in these areas and introduce initiatives that strengthen Qatar's position as a global destination blending authenticity with modernity, providing residents and visitors with a world-class experience year-round.' Qatar Tourism and Visit Qatar are currently preparing to host major events and launch key initiatives in the second half of 2025. The 2025/2026 cruise season will launch in November 2025, building on the success of the previous season, which saw 87 cruise ships dock in Qatar, a 19% increase from the year before, and welcomed over 360,000 visitors, up 4% from the prior season. The second half of the year will also feature the inaugural T100 Triathlon World Championship finals in Doha, held in partnership with the Professional Triathletes Organisation. Other highlights include the FIFA Arab Cup Qatar 2025, the F1 Qatar Airways Qatar Grand Prix 2025, the third Qatar Tourism Awards, the unveiling of the Michelin Guide Doha 2026, along with several other events to be announced soon.
Daily Maverick
an hour ago
- Daily Maverick
Trailblazer at 74: Princess Anne-Sheilah Makhado's inspiring journey in nursing and advocacy
With humour, warmth and steely resolve, Princess Anne-Sheilah Makhado speaks to Spotlight about her long journey as a nurse, of creating solutions in the public health system, and her burning passion for motivating women and girls to unlock their talents. Princess Anne-Sheilah Makhado has worn many hats: that of midwife, professional nurse, motivational speaker, farmer, seamstress, mother and author. Her latest achievement was graduating last year with a PhD in advanced nursing science from the University of Venda at the age of 74. And Makhado is still learning. She recently returned home to Louis Trichardt in Limpopo armed with fresh insight after a month in Beijing visiting her son, who is teaching English in China. 'In China, I observed a lot,' she says. 'It's peaceful and very clean. I've never seen such beautiful red roses right in town, and no one steals these roses. And the elderly there, no one I saw was limping; people are working and they have purpose.' Reflecting on this, she recalls telling her group of retirees in Louis Trichardt that if they want to stay healthy, they need to make an effort to exercise more and keep busy. Keeping busy has been a hallmark of Makhado's life. Fittingly, she describes herself as 'results oriented' and 'thirsty'. She adds: 'I ask God to send me where there is a need.' Makhado's competing priorities came to a head in 2015, when she applied for a Master of Nursing course at the University of Venda. She was 65 at the time. 'The dean said: 'I can't take you' and I said: 'Why?' And she said: 'You got 59.8 marks for your Honours degree.'' This is just below the 60% minimum typically required to qualify for a Master's programme. Looking back, Makhado explains that during her Honours studies, which she completed in 2010, she was also juggling a demanding role as nursing services manager at Midlands Provincial Hospital in Graaff-Reinet, a position she held for six years. 'I had been running an institution where I found nursing issues to not be up to a good standard,' she recalls. The rejection hit hard. 'I cried then, I cried like a baby,' she says. 'Then in 2017, I went back to the university, and I said: 'I am back to repeat my Honours now'.' She completed the degree a second time, earning her graduation in 2018. That same year, she enrolled for her Master's, which she completed in 2020. Child-headed households Her Master's research, which focused on the experiences of child-headed households, was inspired by her work with a non-profit organisation she founded in 2018 called Voice of the Voiceless. Building on this, her PhD explored strategies to improve support for these children. She interviewed 15 child heads of households, aged 14 to 19, along with 15 of their relatives, and conducted additional focus group discussions within the community. 'Many of these children, when asked about their parents, would say: 'We heard that our mother died but we're not sure when, we don't even have a picture of our mum.' And many of them didn't know their father,' she says. A key finding in Makhado's research was a need to educate men around family values. 'That's why, in my recommendations, I said there should be man-to-man programmes because men are [conceiving] children and leaving the children there. Men must learn to take care of their children. Not just dump the mother with the baby. Then the mother has HIV and dies — and the children?' Another key recommendation was that traditional leaders should play a greater role in caring for orphaned children. 'I went to the traditional leaders, and I said: 'You are a traditional leader. What are you doing for these children? You need to have a list of the children who are heading families in your area, and you must visit them.'' With high crime rates, alcohol and drug use, and some child-headed homes unable to secure their doors, Makhado also questioned the role of the community policing forum. '[A]re they aware that these children must be protected and kept safe? The drug sellers know there are no parents and know they can abuse these kids.' Reflecting on conditions in these communities, she says: 'It is painful my darling, traumatic.' From Sophiatown to Limpopo and Chris Hani Baragwanath Hospital Makhado grew up in a tightly-knit family. The second born of seven siblings, soon after her birth in Johannesburg's Sophiatown in 1950, the family moved to Sibasa in Limpopo where her father worked for the then Native Affairs Department and her mother was a school teacher. 'My mother was so neat and clean and organised,' she says. 'My mother taught us never to take no for an answer and to never settle for less.' After attending Shingwedzi Secondary School, she trained and worked first as a teacher, then as a typist. But one day entering a hospital, she recalls: 'I saw the crisp white uniforms, my heart bled and I knew this is what I wanted.' At 27, she started her Diploma in Nursing at the then Groothoek Nursing College in Polokwane, moving to Chris Hani Baragwanath Hospital in Soweto to specialise in midwifery. She says her first job as a nursing sister in Baragwanath's buzzing casualty and neurology sections was 'wonderful, really'. Chuckling, Makhado recalls how one patient grew so enamoured with her, that she suggested Makhado marry her brother: 'So the guy was invited to come and meet me. But he was a short guy and I was not interested in short guys.' How does one become a good nurse? 'Nursing starts with you,' she says. 'The question is: 'How would you like to be treated when you are ill?'' In 1984, Makhado moved back to Limpopo to Elim Hospital and then to the former Transvaal Provincial Hospital — which is now the Louis Trichardt Memorial Hospital — as a clinic sister supervisor, with tasks including managing mobile clinics in the area. 'Working directly with the vulnerable and disadvantaged, women working on farms from a tender age, carrying their babies, I felt a strong need to empower them,' she says. Another issue close to her heart is children with special needs. In 1998, Makhado says she helped set up Tshilwavhusiku Razwimisani, a special needs school for children 25km outside of Louis Trichardt. 'I used to visit schools in that area and picked up so many children who had some type of disability.' As a results-orientated person, she says she couldn't turn a blind eye to this. 'So we sat down and identified an area where we could start a school for the mentally challenged.' Makhado says Tshilwavhusiku Razwimisani started with just 30 pupils and volunteers, including mothers preparing meals. Today, the provincial education department is running the school, which has 298 learners. 'There are moments where I feel like crying. We started from nothing,' she says. Training nurses in Graaff Reinet In 2008, Makhado became the nursing services manager at Midlands Provincial Hospital in Graaff Reinet, in the Eastern Cape. 'There was a lot of unemployment, and many young people would say to me they wanted to do nursing,' she says. But the challenge was the nursing colleges were far away in Mthatha or Gqeberha. The solution came to her: starting a nursing training college at the hospital. 'So I applied to the South African Nursing Council in 2010. Oh, and God has been wonderful, the college was approved in 2012. The next challenge was, where do I get the structures where the school would operate?' Makhado says she then negotiated with the provincial Department of Public Works to renovate buildings for student nurses' accommodation, and with the then mayor of Camdeboo Local Municipality, Hanna Makoba, to secure classrooms. 'I used to go out to furniture shops and ask for whatever furniture… for the nurses,' she recalls. This would become the Midlands Hospital Nursing School, today still an accredited institution within the Eastern Cape health system. During our interview, she checks the spelling of Makoba's name on her phone, saying they have kept in touch. The Master Lock Key Upon retiring from the public sector at Midlands Hospital in 2013, Makhado returned to Louis Trichardt where she focused on motivational speaking, continuing her community outreach work and studies. She also wrote a book called The Master Lock Key. 'It has been and will always be in my deepest innermost thoughts that women are the backbone of the nation. If women can learn to stand firmly in great numbers and become more assertive in issues that concern themselves, their families and the nation, I believe there will be a better future,' she wrote. Makhado is divorced and a mother of three children: two daughters and a son, and three grandchildren. When she struggled to make ends meet on a nursing salary, she says she sewed for extra income. 'My mother, when we grew up, she used to show us how to sew. She gave me that skill. So when times were tough, I did some sewing. I used to produce track suits for schools. When I came back from working as a nurse, I would take out my sewing machines.' Makhado relays how farming and growing food has been another enduring joy. Presently, she heads gardening projects that supply the Spar in Louis Trichardt with spinach, beetroot and garlic. 'It's quite amazing,' she says. 'I encourage all, I urge women and girls, let us work and fight poverty and hunger instead of idleness and being dependent. Women have this dependency syndrome. I said: 'Oh no, we cannot go on like this!'' As our conversation draws to a close, Makhado underscores South Africa's need for women leaders, saying that 'anything is within a woman's power'. She adds: 'This country needs women's listening ears and caring touch, but also thinkers, risk takers. Risk is the spice of life. What we women can achieve is virtually limitless.' DM
