Uganda's Makerere University investigates degree cheats
One of Africa's most prestigious universities is investigating how 300 students managed to get their degree results changed.
Uganda's Makerere University discovered that the students' marks had been tampered with in 2015.
It
is thought that some people responsible for managing the results system
were behind the changes, Vice-Chancellor Barnabas Nawangwe said.
They are being investigated and the students' degrees have been withheld.
The
BBC's Patience Atuhaire in the capital, Kampala, says that the
university-wide investigation will compare questionable degrees with
students' result papers and exam results submitted by lecturers and
colleges to their deans, going back to 2011. It will also look at the
academic registrar's records.
Two years ago, 600 students from the
College of Humanities and Social Sciences were removed from the
graduation list, after a whistle-blower pointed out that their marks
were lower than the pass mark for their courses.
The university,
in Kampala, is one of the most well known on the continent and has
40,000 students, many from outside the country.
Among its
graduates are a number of current and former heads of state including
Tanzania's first president, Julius Nyerere, and Kenyan author Ngugi wa
Thiong'o.
But Professor Nawangwe told the BBC's Focus on Africa
programme that the attempted cheating would not damage the university's
integrity as "we were able to arrest the situation before anyone was
able to get our academic papers".
He said that the staff
suspected of being involved have been suspended and security measures
are now in place to "make it extremely difficult for anyone to do that
kind of thing again".
BBC
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