Minister battles with MUST
The conflict between the Ministry of Higher Education and Misr University for Science and Technology took on a new dimension after the two sides took their battle to the press. Mona El-Nahhas investigates
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The Private Universities Council during their meeting this week
photo: Sherif Mahmoud
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Last week the Private Universities Council -- which is chaired by Minister of Higher Education Moufid Shehab and was formed in 2002 to supervise private universities -- banned the Misr University for Science and Technology (MUST) from accepting new students next year. The decision was made in light of several violations that MUST -- one of the four private universities established in 1996 by a presidential decree -- allegedly committed by accepting students into its faculties of pharmacology, dentistry and medicine.
Before the start of the current academic year, MUST accepted students in excess of the limit set by the council. Moreover, the council says that the university had accepted a number of students who did not have the minimum grades required for enrollment at the three faculties. The council vowed, during last week's meeting, not to recognise the graduation certificates of those students who it said were enrolled in violation of the previously determined rules and terms.
Abdallah Barakat, the council's secretary-general, stated that the decision was in line with Article 26 of the executive statutes. The statutes, passed in late 2002, cited a number of penalties which the council should impose on violating universities.
Reacting angrily, MUST placed a full-page advertisement in most national and opposition newspapers last Friday, attacking the decree and contesting its legality. The advertisement, entitled "A statement to the public", included details of the two-year crisis between the ministry and the university. The statement defended the university's approach, saying "it was obliged to accept additional students to help solve the problems encountered by Arab students trying to complete their studies in the US and in some West European countries following the events of 11 September."
The statement also questioned the legality of the executive statutes for including rules which have nothing to do with the private universities law passed in 1992. The university also stated that it has no other alternative but to appeal to the judiciary to counter the injustice inflicted upon it.
The minister then hurried to publish a statement of his own last Sunday, in which he refuted the university's approach and recounted the several violations committed by the institution over two consecutive years.
During a press conference held on Monday Shehab asserted that the council's decree is final, adding that it was taken after the council lost patience with MUST. "The university has turned a deaf ear to the three deadlines it was given to correct the status of students registered in violation of the rules, and to transfer them to alternative faculties," Shehab said.
The minister called upon those students who are in violation of the rules to immediately find the means to transfer their credits to other universities, or else their academic future will be lost.
University President Abdel-Aziz Hammouda told Al- Ahram Weekly that the university did not refuse to transfer students who had been improperly registered. "We simply asked for a new 10-day deadline to begin the transfer measures, as the results of the mid-term exams were announced late. Yet our request was turned down," he said. As for the current situation of the students, Hammouda said: "Such students are allowed to take back their papers, attached with a certificate proving that they passed the mid-term exams."
Contrary to the moderate attitude of Hammouda, the board of trustees who represent the owners refused to give ground at all. They insisted that the status of their students is 100 per cent legal. "They were accepted by means of a court verdict, so they were granted legal immunity against any later judiciary ruling," said MUST's media spokesman, Mahmoud El-Deiri, speaking on behalf of the university owners.
The story of the illegally registered students dates back to the last academic year, when MUST allegedly committed the same violations at its pharmacology faculty, and was banned by a decree passed by Shehab from accepting students this year. MUST's owners contested the decree before the Administrative Court and a ruling was passed in their favour last October.
Shehab declared that he was willing to respect the ruling but at the same time appealed to the Supreme Administrative Court. And while he allowed MUST to accept new pharmacology students he nevertheless made it a condition that their number should not exceed 430. MUST disregarded his warning and accepted more than 700 students. MUST also accepted students in excess of the stipulated numbers in its faculties of medicine and dentistry. Excess students were not given documents legalising their admission, while the rest received registration cards bearing the seal of the ministry and Shehab's written approval from the ministry's admission bureau.
Last November, the excess students were shocked by the ruling of the Supreme Administrative Court annulling the ruling of the lower court. Following the ruling, Shehab declared that those students whose admission was approved by the ministry will not be affected. However he called upon the university to amend the status of other students registered in excess of stipulated allotments. Three deadlines, the last of which was set for 14 February, were given to the university to complete the transfer of those students who were in breach of the law. The university did not respond, however, on the grounds that the Private Universities Council and the executive statutes were unconstitutional.
The council's decision, which was fiercely attacked by university owners, met with the approval of the five other private universities. The three syndicates of doctors, dentists and pharmacists also declared their full support for the council in the dispute.
