What sort of professional virtues and values are developed when there is a determined attempt to destroy the academic structure of the country when thousands (particularly more than half) of the students failed to graduate because of failure to pay school fees while ZIMDEF did not even twitch or offer a condolence message (in the least) to the academic murder that we have just witnessed at Harare Polytechnic college.
ZIMDEFS negligence should surely be questioned and cautioned. Where is the fund directed when prospective graduands are not accorded their certificates? Certainly a commission of inquiry has to be established to look into the issue as soon as possible before another batch of students are denied graduation on the basis of failure to pay fees while we have statutory bodies to cater for such. Its time we draw battle lines for the survival of the intellectual reserve in this country.
Meanwhile the Minister of Higher and Tertiary Education, Stan Mudenge also defiantly stated that all students shall not be discriminated on financial grounds in writing examinations while capping a record ridiculous half college at the graduation ceremony. This is tactless mockery by the Minister. Is it that the Minister is ignorant of the multitudes that are failing to pay fees and are banished from education by their respective college administrations or he is plainly complicit in the whole arrangement of which he appears to be coordinating?
It is high time we espouse some nobleness and maturity when the academic livelihood of a generation is at stake. To the perpetrators of collective mischief and negligence, be warned.
Samson Nxumalo is an exiled Secretary General of the National University of Science and Technology, ZINASU Bulawayo Regional Chairman and Media Institute of Southern Africa Advocacy committee member (Mat. North Region)
Post published in: Opinions