Closure of private universities: Is it a destruction or development? By Jacob Atem, JUBA, RSS
MAY 15/2012, SSN; On the 10th of May 2012, Hon. Adwok Nyaba, the minister for higher education, decided to make news by closing down almost all private universities in the country with immediate effect from Thursday the 10th of May 2012. The reasons given for closing down all these institutions were among others; a university must own an area of 25 Kilometer square of land, lack of sufficient fields for developing physical, mental or social recreations, irregularities in employment contracts for lecturers and inadequate lecture rooms, etc..... Let us analyze the above requirements one by one: To begin with land issue; sincerely speaking, none of the institutions operating in South Sudan whether a private or public University has acquired an area of 25 kilometer square of land in Juba. This is a size of old Juba town and given the current situation of land in Juba, I believe there is no university that can get such an area of land, even the few Public universities that were allowed to operate cannot and will not be able to acquire such a land. I took a tour around Juba University with a colleague of mine yesterday, May 13th, 2012 to see if our first and number one university met this requirement of land. We discovered that Juba University has an area of less than one Kilo meter square. Mr. Minister should convince the public on this point, whether the twenty five kilometer square of land is a requirement for private universities alone. Godfather of Ghost University: Contrary to all these, St. Mary University, whose existing location is not known here in South Sudan, was told to regularize its registration. Its physical location is nowhere to be seen in town let alone acquiring an area of twenty five km square of land. This might be because St. Mary University came through the honorable Nyaba in which the minister falls in the category of the term ‘’godfather’’ for the investment of this institution. Hon. Nyaba, in my opinion should be let known of the practice of patriotism rather than self conscience in decision making while in public office. Lack of sufficient fields for developing physical, mental or social recreations; this cannot prompt our Hon. Minister to close down these institutions which are working very hard in developing our human resources on our soil. Republic of South Sudan is a government of the people, by the people and for the people. Hence, its priorities and interests should be public interest first. These facilities can be addressed as time goes. Irregularities in employment contracts; surely one can assist me on this point; none of the employed lecturers in all these private universities went to the office of Hon. Member, the Minister, to complain about his/her contract with private universities. And in reality, should that be Mr. Nyaba`s concern or the Ministry of Labor concern? I can see an overlap of office TORs here, ladies and gentlemen. Inadequate lecture room, this problem is faced by all institutions in this Republic including public universities. Take an example of Juba University, does it has adequate lecture rooms? No. The first year students at Juba University were studying under tents, we have never studied under tents at the private Universities. The question is, what determines the quality of education, is it the quality of lectures or the buildings? This was just put in place as an obstacle for these private universities. Our Professor Dr. Nyaba missed a very vital point here; Education is not about a nice brick used to build the house and not about a beautiful iron sheet used to cover the lecture rooms, rather, the quality of the materials used in constructing it, and I believe we fit pretty well here. Assessment of whether these private universities offer quality education or not, should have been measured through students of these universities by going through their marked exams scripts, their ordinary and Advanced certificates, diplomas and degrees acquired from other institutions from within and outside Sudan. I personally believe, many current government‘s workforce studied under the trees or in a grass thatched class rooms up to secondary school levels during the war in either IDP camps or in Refugee camps, may be with the exception of a few who are calling themselves “the literates of the South”. The question is, aren’t those who studied under trees and grass thatched houses delivering great services now to our Government? Let us say the SPLM or any other government of that time closed down these schools because they have no sufficient fields for developing physical, mental or social recreations, what would have happened after our independence? We would have contracted competent human resources from other countries in order to work for the government of South Sudan, and our economics were going to be at a stake let alone that our government's affairs were going to be under the control of foreign elements. If Adwok is working in the interest of his people, the very people he is serving as a servant, he couldn’t have made such a decision at this critical time when our country is at war with the Republic of Sudan, the economic is in it terrible shape, some of the public universities are padlocked by him, the droughts are on high gear, crimes are taking a toll, etc, etc. These private universities have been operating in South Sudan for nearly five years since they were established. Meaning they have already graduated many students who are now working in public and private sectors. By closing down their former universities will also lead to them being disqualified from their various positions of work and they will automatically loss jobs and become redundant. Another group of victims are those students who are now in second year, third year and fourth year of the closed down universities. They have spent their hard earned money on tuition fees, Research, stationeries and other fees related to their studies. Expenses incurred by each student of these universities are so huge that it can be around SSP 20,000 – 25,000 for the entire course. The right to education: To be honest, where on earth, the government of the people, by the people and for the people can wish its own citizens a bad luck? It is the responsibility of every government to make sure that every citizen has the right to education but not to destroy or take away whatever small knowledge he/she acquired. The motive behind this decision is to stir up chaos in the country. The affected students would go on demonstrations and the enemy of this country shall have the best laugh on us, this is not a developmental plan but you will agree with me it is a planned destruction. The Minister could have worked toward developing these private universities from the current state to the better stage by encouraging competition among all the higher institutions of learning. Closing down these private universities would translate to education suicide stage. We can rebuild our education system but that should not be at the expense of ordinary citizens who are struggling to make ends meet. Rescue education from Nyaba: Yes we can restructure our education system but we don’t need to build heaven on earth in a single day. Since we all know this country is starting from scratch, strengthening education system must be a process. We must build on from small space of learning to the proposed 25 Kilo meter square of land for every university. I would request our council of ministers to rescue education system from the Hon. Minister. Finally, I am appealing to all the affected students from the closed down universities and the public at large to remain calm and wait for the best solution from our trusted council of ministers. Our government is tirelessly looking into the matter and will soon come out with the right decision. The author lives in Juba and can be reached on: [email protected] or call 0955 230 104 COMMENTS, PLEASE CLICK HERE Disclaimer: The views expressed above are solely those of the author(s) and do not represent those of the website. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "South Sudan Info - The Kob" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/SouthSudanKob?hl=en.
