Former Busoga university students miss nursing exams
Affected. Busoga University campus in Iganga District, which government closed over lack of minimum operating standards last year. FILE PHOTO
KAMPALA-Nursing students of the former Busoga University are stuck after the institutions they were relocated to last month demanded that they pay fees before sitting end of semester exams.
The students who have since been distributed to three nursing institutions; Lubega School of Nursing in Iganga, Johnass International College of Health Sciences in Buikwe District, and Iganga School of Nursing, claim they had already paid tuition to Busoga University School of Nursing and Midwifery before government closed it and offered to turn it into a public university.
“We are beginning exams tomorrow (Thursday). I had already paid my fees for the semester but when I was brought here at Lubega Nursing, they want me to pay again which my parents said they don’t have,” one of the affected students who requested for anonymity to speak freely, told Daily Monitor in an interview on Wednesday.
At Busoga University, the students said they were paying Shs1.4 million per semester against Shs1.8 million the new institutions are demanding yet the students were posted there less than a month to the end of the semester.
But Ms Safinah Museene, Business, Technical and Vocational Education Training (BTVET) commissioner on Wednesday advised the students to seek court redress saying as the Ministry of Education, their role was to ensure that the affected students were placed in other nursing institutions to enable them continue with their studies.
“We are not going to look into the past. We didn’t audit the university to see who had paid or not. We wanted to manage the crisis by making sure the students don’t miss exams. We would like to advise the students to take legal action against Busoga University. As for us, we were not there when they paid. Our mandate was to see that the students complete their studies,” she said.
The students said on Wednesday that the government was acting irresponsible and instead of protecting them, they were “dumped in the new institutions without an explanation” and now it is difficult to organise their colleagues to go to court since they are scattered in different institutions.
On May 9, Mr James Mugerwa, the Ministry of Educations assistant commissioner in charge of vocational education wrote to Busoga University School of Nursing and Midwifery principal informing him that his office had distributed their students to other institutions.
This followed the government’s closure of the university for failing to meet minimal standards last year.
However, President Yoweri Museveni early this year setup a committee chaired by State Minister for Higher Education, Dr Chrysostom Muyingo, to investigate the circumstances under which the university was closed, before government takes it over.
