All varsity lecturers’ papers under probe

KIGALI -The National Council for Higher Education (NCHE) has asked all universities to forward academic transcripts of their teaching staff for verification in a stepped up campaign against forged papers. NCHE Executive Director, Prof. Pamela Abbott confirmed yesterday that a directive has already been issued to both public and private universities’ administrations. “We have written to them. After submitting the lecturers’s papers, then we shall know who possesses forged transcripts,” Abbott said in an exclusive interview at her office in Kacyiru. She explained: “The verification process will take sometime but we need lecturers who can match international standards.” NCHE is the government’s agency mandated to ensure quality and oversee the planning of all tertiary institutions in the country. Abbott (right) said that the verification exercise is aimed at helping identify competent lecturers who can render quality education to students. She said the verification procedures are comprehensive and will get to the ‘root cause of the problem’. She disclosed that the vetting process involves contacting the lecturers’ previous schools. Some university rectors have already complied, she said. “First, we shall check whether a university one attended exists. The second move is to find out whether the lecturer indeed went to that university,” Abbott explained. The NCHE’s vetting process comes months after police arrested a self-proclaimed National University of Rwanda (NUR) lecturer, Emmanuel Gakwaya, for allegedly using forged academic papers. Documents at CID indicated that Gakwaya got a Masters and PhD on the same day and that the US university he claims to have attended doesn’t exist. He was arrested with another ‘consultant’, Rambeli Gatera, who had been hired as a financial consultant in the Ministry of Education. There are reports that a number of expatriates working in the country, especially in tertiary institutions, could be in possession of fake papers. Concerns of employees with fraudulent academic transcripts came to the limelight during the Fourth Government Retreat at Akagera Game Lodge early this year.Ends