By Julius Aboko
The guild office is a relatively isolated and less visited place especially at the start of every semester. However, as the registration deadline approaches, things change. Students, either in groups or individually, flock the place. The guild president, ministers and MPs are booked in endless appointments. Why? Among other things, students are lobbying for the Guild Scholarship Fund (GSF).

The GSF is a top-up financial facility the student government offers to needy ones to complete university fees.  However, the fact that some students now plan in advance to receive the fund, with some even going an extra mile to ‘influence’ guild officials suggests that, although there are needy students, some are merely victims of poor personal financial management.
Brian Kajwengye, MP Non-Residents, who has himself been lobbied, attests to the theory of financial indiscipline among students. He says,
“Many students apply for GSF, and some of them even try dirty tricks on guild officials. Most of these students need small amounts like Sh100,000. However, my honest understanding is that, some students are not necessarily needy, but merely victims of poor personal finance management,” he explains.
According to Vincent Kisenyi, the dean of the faculty of business and administration at UCU, poor personal financial management is a habit, which comes about because of, “failing to appropriately plan and prioritise one’s expenditures, spending beyond one’s means and, or merely a tendency of someone misappropriating their funds.”
So how good are UCU students in this field of financial management?
“I can’t tell whether or not students are good financial managers. But based on my experience and that of my friends, I don’t think many are good at this art. I always pay my fees in time, but usually suffer with pocket money. At times, I plan my expenditures, but rarely follow them,” said Jonathan, a second-year law student.
 “To be honest, some students live extravagant and irresponsible lives while at campus,” says Kajwengye. In addition to poor planning, Kajwengye identifies alcoholism, boy/girlfriend relationships, peer pressure and failure to set right priorities as the main reasons why some students spend far above their limits.  In extreme cases, this student leader says, “Some students use their tuition money to start small businesses like selling airtime, confectionaries, etc, hoping to reap profits, but end up incurring heavy losses.”
When asked, Kisenyi acknowledged the severity of financial indiscipline among students, but further observed that, “Poor personal financial management is a big problem, not only to students, but staff members and other people outside this community.”
So, what’s the way forward?
According to Kisenyi, poor financial management is brought about by poor decisions and therefore people simply need to observe financial discipline. He says thus,
“People need to be disciplined while handling money. First, know how much money you have, plan your expenses in advance, remember to set your priorities right and above all spend within your limits.” He went on to urge,
“For students who invest tuition money in business, I advise you to be very careful. Before you use that money, ask yourself, if the business fails, will there be another way to recover the money? And by the way, you were given that money for tuition and putting it in business is misappropriation.”
Kisenyi further says his faculty considers financial indiscipline as a serious problem and has already designed various programmes to teach students and the community about personal financial management.
As part of this plan, Kisenyi says the Faculty of Business Administration will, this April, hold a 12-session seminar to teach entrepreneurial skills to students.
The training dubbed Students Training in Entrepreneurship Programme (STEP) will result in students’ groups getting interest-free seed money to start small projects.
The training will be open to all non-business students of UCU.