• It is necessary to develop regulations to operationalize the amendments.
• The Amendment Act has brought about a number of changes to the sector.
• It is important to highlight the changes and impact they will have on the Higher Education Sector.

Higher Education Authority (HEA) says the Higher Education Amendment Act of 2021 has extended the quality assurance functions of the Authority to Higher education institutions that were under other regulatory bodies.
Authority Director General, Professor Stephen Simukanga disclosed that the Amendment Act has streamlined accreditation functions that were previously undertaken by various regulatory and professional bodies, thereby removing the overlapping mandates of the regulatory and professional institutions.
Professor Simukanga explained that the regulations will provide the criteria for the registration of private higher education institutions, recognition of public higher education institutions, accreditation of learning programmes, affiliation, classification of higher education institutions, academic ranks and appointment of staff, institutional audits as well as general provisions.
“To implement the Higher Education (Amendment) Act, 2021, it is necessary to develop regulations to operationalize the amendments. Thus, these series of workshops are designed to consult our stakeholders on the regulations developed before consideration by the Ministry of Justice and issuance of the Statutory Instrument containing regulations by the Minister of Education.”
“The Amendment Act has brought about a number of changes to the sector and, as such, it is important to highlight these changes and the impact that they will have on the Higher Education Sector. These changes will be highlighted in detail in the various presentations that will be made during these workshops,” Professor Simukanga explained.
He revealed that the Authority will hold 4 stakeholder engagement workshops in the coming weeks in order to consult relevant stakeholders drawn from all the 10 provinces of the country, and also sensitize Colleges that have come under the purview of the Authority following Amendments to the Higher Education Act, 2013.
“In addition to the regulations, these meetings will focus on the Impact of the Regulations on operations of higher education institutions. In this regard, a regulatory impact assessment was conducted by the Authority in conjunction with the Business Regulatory Review Agency.”
“The results of the Impact Assessment will culminate in proposals for the review and introduction of user fees which will be part of the statutory instrument. The goal is to ensure that the user fees are both cost reflective and have negligible impact on the cost of doing business for the higher education subsector,” he stated.
Professor Simukanga commended the technical team at the Higher Education Authority, Ministry of Justice and the Business Regulatory Review Agency for their effort to this point.
He was speaking during a Workshop on the Sensitization and Consultation of the Higher Education Amendment Act, the new Statutory Instrument and Regulatory Impact Assessment for Lusaka and Eastern provinces.